Struggling with positive thinking?

As psychiatry, which uses medical and biological methods to treat mental disorders, has largely overtaken psychotherapy, which relies on non-biological approaches such as conversation and counselling, psychotherapists have sought alternative challenges.

One common approach is to focus on enhancing the happiness of mentally healthy people, rather than relieving the mental pain and trauma of those who are suffering. This is known as "positive psychology" and has recently expanded to accommodate not only psychologists, but also social workers, life coaches and new age therapists.

But there is evidence to suggest the approach has a negative side. Perhaps the most common advice made by positive psychologists is that we should seize the day and live in the moment.

Doing so helps us be more positive and avoid three of the most infamous emotional states, which I call the RAW emotions: regret, anger and worry. Ultimately, it suggests that we avoid focusing too much on regrets and anger about the past, or worries about the future.

It sounds like an easy task. But human psychology is evolutionarily hardwired to live in the past and the future. Other species have instincts and reflexes to help with their survival, but human survival relies very much on learning and planning.

You can't learn without living in the past, and you can't plan without living in the future. Regret, for example, which can make us suffer by reflecting on the past, is an indispensable mental mechanism for learning from one's own mistakes to avoid repeating them. Worries about the future are likewise essential to motivate us to do something that is somewhat unpleasant today but can create gain or spare us a greater loss in the future.