Accentuate the Positive

On a number of occasions, President Gordon B. Hinckley counseled us to "accentuate the positive":

"I come to you tonight with a plea that we stop seeking out the storms and enjoy more fully the sunlight. I am suggesting that as we go through life we try to 'accentuate the positive.' I am asking that we look a little deeper for the good, that we still our voices of insult and sarcasm, that we more generously compliment virtue and effort." 

-- Be Not Afraid, Only Believe, CES Fireside for Young Adults, September 9, 2001.  
-- Let Not Your Heart be Troubled, an address at BYU, October 29, 1974.
-- "Words of the Prophet: The Spirit of Optimism" in The New Era, July 2001


“Don’t be gloomy. Do not dwell on unkind things. Stop seeking out the storms and enjoy more fully the sunlight. Even if you are not happy, put a smile on your face. ‘Accentuate the positive.’ Look a little deeper for the good. Go forward in life with a twinkle in your eye and a smile on your face, with great and strong purpose in your heart. Love life.”

-- I found this quoted in many places.  What I did not find was a reference to the original.


If I recall correctly, once, when giving this counsel, President Hinckley referred to the song of the same name.  It's a good song, with a snappy tune.  According to Wikipedia (I'm sure you will forgive the reference to Wiki since this is not a college paper), "The music was written by Harold Arlen and the lyrics by Johnny Mercer, and it was published in 1944. It is sung in the style of a sermon, and explains that accentuating the positive is key to happiness. In describing his inspiration for the lyric, Mercer told the Pop Chronicles radio documentary "I went to hear Father Divine and he had a sermon and his subject was 'you got to accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative.' And I said 'Wow, that's a colorful phrase!'

"Mercer recorded the song, with The Pied Pipers and Paul Weston's orchestra, on October 4, 1944, and it was released by Capitol Records as catalog number 180. The record first reached the Billboard magazine charts on January 4, 1945 and lasted 13 weeks on the chart, peaking at number 2."

Since then, the song has been recorded by Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters, Kay Kyser, Dinah Washington and Lionel Hampton, Artie Shaw, Johnny Green, Connie Francis, Ella Fitzgerald, Perry Como, Aretha Franklin, Susannah McCorkle, Sam Cooke, Paul McCartney and many others.  The song has appeared in film and television: Here Come the Waves (1944), The Dean Martin Variety Show (1967), The Singing Detective (BBC, 1986), Bugsy (1991), The Mighty Ducks (1992).  The song was used as the theme song for the T.V. series Homefront (1991-1993), which was set in the years following World War II.

Here is a video with the recording by Mercer and the Pied Pipers:

 
These are the lyrics:


Gather 'round me, everybody
Gather 'round me while I'm preachin'
Feel a sermon comin' on me
The topic will be sin and that's what I'm ag'in'
If you wanna hear my story
The settle back and just sit tight
While I start reviewin'
The attitude of doin' right

You've got to accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
And latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between

You've got to spread joy up to the maximum
Bring gloom down to the minimum
Have faith or pandemonium's
Liable to walk upon the scene

To illustrate my last remark
Jonah in the whale, Noah in the ark
What did they do just when everything looked so dark?

(Man, they said "We'd better accentuate the positive")
("Eliminate the negative")
("And latch on to the affirmative")
Don't mess with Mister In-Between (No!)
Don't mess with Mister In-Between

(Ya got to spread joy up to the maximum)
(Bring gloom down to the minimum)
(Have faith or pandemonium's)
(Liable to walk upon the scene)

You got to ac (yes, yes) -cent-tchu-ate the positive
Eliminate (yes, yes) the negative
And latch (yes, yes) on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between
No, don't mess with Mister In-Between

I have found that singing this song makes it easier to take President Hinckley's counsel to "accentuate the positive."  Don't mess with mister in-between.