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I think it's more about the delivery. For instance: A coworker grabs me and pushes me out of the way mid sentence into a conversation with a patient. She's uneducated and was extremely rude. A few minutes after I had the chance to cool off I calmly invited her to a sit down conversation away from everyone else. I politely asked her how she would feel if someone grabbed her and pushed her out of the way mid sentence when she was working with a patient? She said "Irritated." I said "thank you." She apologized and I accepted. Here's how I felt and wanted to say. You ignorant rectum, touch me again and I'll have you arrested for assault. Negative, snarly, out spoken and counter productive. Not everything in life is pleasant and there are times when you have to be negative but it can be turned into a positive. That coworker and I have a good working relationship now. Well worth turning that negative into a positive.
Yes, I often get called negative by my mom and sisters for simply expressing an opinion or factual statement.
Often times it's just matter of fact stuff like, "if I don't save more money I won't have enough money for retirement."
My mom thinks that is a bad way to think and everything will just work out if I just keep a smile on my face and a positive attitude.
My family is exactly the same way. My parents have lost a lot of income and depleted their retirement savings over the past ten years, yet when asked about retirement, they say they'll "get by," that "it all works out," or "the Lord will provide."
There are a lot of people for whom things just don't work out and they ended up in a really bad place. Sadly, lots of people want to bury their heads in the sand and characterize any real question as "negativity."
The thing about it is, all of us are expected to smile and put on a happy face. At work. At home. If someone asks, "how are you?", it is NEVER socially acceptable to say something like, "honestly. My life sucks." Don't get me wrong - I understand why that's the case. The truth of the matter is, most people do not want to hear about other people's problems because we have our own to deal with. And that's OK.
The only point I'm making in all of this is that we're all expected to smile and pretend that everything is OK, so anytime someone points out that a piece of sh*t actually does stink..........they get labeled as negative.
For example - I got into a bit of an argument with a friend of mine at a bar the other night. The song "Happy" by Pharrell came on. I'm sure you all have heard it, it's a huge hit on the radio. I hear it at work 25 times a day thanks to my coworkers. Anyway, my friend said he liked the song. I told him I hated it. He told me that if I hated the song, it means I'm an unhappy person (which of course pissed me off).
My thing is this (and this is what I told him) - a 5 year old could make a song about being happy. But I just happen to feel that negative emotions like anger and depression are often our most meaningful, most brutally honest emotions..........it's ugly, it's messy, and nobody wants to talk about it........but that's also why I often like music/art with dark, depressing themes. It just feels more real. Clapping your hands to a "happy song" somehow seems disingenuous. Not that all reality is dark and depressing, but still.........I just feel like telling everybody your happy is what you're SUPPOSED to do. It's what expected, even if the way you feel is the exact opposite.
The thing about it is, all of us are expected to smile and put on a happy face. At work. At home. If someone asks, "how are you?", it is NEVER socially acceptable to say something like, "honestly. My life sucks." Don't get me wrong - I understand why that's the case. The truth of the matter is, most people do not want to hear about other people's problems because we have our own to deal with. And that's OK.
The only point I'm making in all of this is that we're all expected to smile and pretend that everything is OK, so anytime someone points out that a piece of sh*t actually does stink..........they get labeled as negative.
For example - I got into a bit of an argument with a friend of mine at a bar the other night. The song "Happy" by Pharrell came on. I'm sure you all have heard it, it's a huge hit on the radio. I hear it at work 25 times a day thanks to my coworkers. Anyway, my friend said he liked the song. I told him I hated it. He told me that if I hated the song, it means I'm an unhappy person (which of course pissed me off).
My thing is this (and this is what I told him) - a 5 year old could make a song about being happy. But I just happen to feel that negative emotions like anger and depression are often our most meaningful, most brutally honest emotions..........it's ugly, it's messy, and nobody wants to talk about it........but that's also why I often like music/art with dark, depressing themes. It just feels more real. Clapping your hands to a "happy song" somehow seems disingenuous. Not that all reality is dark and depressing, but still.........I just feel like telling everybody your happy is what you're SUPPOSED to do. It's what expected, even if the way you feel is the exact opposite.
Am I crazy?
Kind of. Because you don't seem to understand that there's a time, place, and manner for expressing those kinds of opinions.
Let's turn the tables. You have a song or an artist that you like. So how do you feel if somebody walks in and craps all over your musical tastes, and doesn't do so in a diplomatic way? For that's what you essentially did to your friend.
Not only did you tell him that a favored piece of music was total crap (I would actually agree with you in that regard), but you then told him that one would have to be an intellectual cypher to like something like that. I mean, if you're Lester Bangs, the legendary rock critic for Rolling Stone, you might be able to get away with it, but few others can. I mean, hey, not everything has to be deep and meaningful. There are times when I just want to listen to something fun, and a guy like you pretty much ruined the mood. What's more, rock snobs wallowing in a kind of pubescent and nihilistic funk are among the worst of all.
And that's the thing. People who blather on about "I hate this" and "I hate that" are really insufferable egotists at their hearts. They can't imagine someone liking something they don't, so they're going to make sure to edify the other person with their superior tastes. They can't simply say, "Hey, this is nice, but can we listen to something else at the moment?" Why? Because they have to inflict their opinion on everyone else because, in their shriveled little hearts, their opinion is the only one that really matters. I mean, hey, I like progressive jazz, but I also realize that not many do. I can't stand country music, but if someone else likes it, I'll listen awhile. Because a different musical taste doesn't make them shallow or inconsequential people.
So, I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's quite possible to be true to yourself, you realize, without sucking all the life and energy out of the room. It's quite possible to make your tastes and opinions known without trashing the tastes and opinions of others. But doing so requires some basic courtesy for others.
That means that being constantly labelled as 'negative' isn't because you're some lonely outpost of truth and good taste. Don't flatter yourself. It mean that you're more likely a guy who is so enamored with his own august judgement that he really doesn't care about the opinions and feelings of others. In the end, those people are just a pain in the ass to be around, for they destroy all the happiness in the room. And happiness is something that is decidedly in short supply.
The thing about it is, all of us are expected to smile and put on a happy face. At work. At home. If someone asks, "how are you?", it is NEVER socially acceptable to say something like, "honestly. My life sucks."
A couple years ago, I saw a guy outside a convenience store whom I had seen once since high school (I graduated in 2003; he graduated in 2002). Instead of asking me "How are you?", he asked "How is the cesspool of consciousness treating you?" I didn't think he knew me well enough to know that I personally was very much a receptive audience for that sort of question, so it made me wonder (later on) how often he used that line. If only that question were more common among society at large, IMO.
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VERY common in the Midwest, esp with churchy types.
