As most long-time readers would guess, I don’t have much truck with the concepts of positivity. The appropriate and mindful attitude of most investors should be a constant expectation of something going wrong, because our mindless reptilian brains will automatically gravitate to the sunny upsides of over-optimism given the slightest reason.
Generally the advocates of positive thinking are in the ascendency – they tell people something they want to hear, namely that you can have what you want merely by wishing for it. This is the magical law of attraction and not only can it impoverish investors directly it also does so indirectly, through its effects on managers and employees. Exercised as mind-control it’s repellent, unnatural and destructive. Get real, folks.
