The Power of Positive Thought

I was fascinated by a piece in The Guardian recently about a new book by a woman who discovered that she had breast cancer rallying against the current obsession with the power of positive thought.

Barbara Ehrenreich soon found that expressing anger about her cancer was deemed to be the wrong way of dealing with it. Indeed, a whole industry of positive thought has emerged, promoting the idea that positive thinking alone can help reduce your risk of cancer, and that giving vent to negative feelings of frustration and hurt is simply unacceptable.

I find this whole idea really interesting, as a similar view seems to be gaining credence in the fertility world. Those going through IVF are encouraged to visualise a positive outcome, to imagine the baby they long for growing in their womb. They are told that thinking positively and remaining calm will increase the chances of a successful outcome.

I am sure that there is some merit in this for some people, but not for everyone. The reality is that IVF is often unsuccessful, and imagining that you can help yourself to get pregnant by thinking positively just gives you one more way to blame yourself if it doesn't work for you - you must have failed to visualise successfully, you must have allowed too many negative thoughts to cross your mind.

When I wrote The Complete Guide to IVF , I felt very strongly about this and did all I could to encourage people to see that what they did was most unlikely to alter the outcome of their treatment as long as they were sensible. Perhaps what we need now though is a Barbara Ehrenreich book about the fertility industry!