The Positivity Protocol: How Reverse Engineering Your Past Wires Your Brain For Default Optimism (And Unfucks Your Life)

Look, we’re about to tell you something that sounds like it belongs on a vision board next to a stock photo of a woman laughing alone with salad. But stay with me here, because this one actually works, and we’re not trying to sell you a course or slowly convince you to buy crystals.

It’s called Retroactive Optimism.

And before you click away thinking this is some Law of Attraction nonsense your aunt shares on Facebook between minion memes, hear me out. Because the core idea is stupidly simple and backed by actual neuroscience, physics and pattern recognition and all that stuff that makes it not woowoo.

Here’s the premise: You go back through all the worst shit that ever happened to you (fun, I know) and you trace what actually came after it. Not in a toxic positivity “everything happens for a reason, just manifest harder!” way. More in a “WTF, wait, that terrible thing literally redirected my entire life toward something better and I never connected those dots” type of way.

The universe, god, or whatever you want to call it (simulation, algorithm, neutral force that doesn’t care about your feelings), has this annoying habit of handing you exactly what you need wrapped in packaging that looks like a complete catastrophe.