Allows you to accept and prepare for the worst without wasting energy hoping for something that’s never going to happen. I don’t see optimism as providing any options. It’s just hoping. Hope in one hand…
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Couldn’t tell you who the winners were, other than I think the Saints won last year, but as for the worst:
1.Lions
2.Lions
3.Lions
I’m fairly sure without checking that I got at least two of those right. Of course, you could argue that as they’re a pretty egregious case, I may have simply proved your exception.
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Optimism gets your butt out of bed to look for work after you’ve been laid off. It makes the classified section look promising, it gives you the courage to cold-call a hiring manager, and it gives you hope that out of the quadrillion resumes you’ve just sent out, maybe one of them will strike paydirt.
Pessimism. I can see it making you a more depressing person to be around. I can see it giving you plenty of excuses not to look for work. But I’m not seeing how it will help you get a job.
But I’m hopeful you’ll be able to help me understand!
When I have a problem at work, I am optimistic that I can find a solution, even if I’ve never seen this problem before. It’s worked for me, because in the end I’ve always been able to find a solution. (I’m a software engineer.)
Good thing - if I were a pessimist, I’d just give up right away because I’d say that there was no solution, and the situation was hopeless. I’d be out of a job within a week.
My job is to find solutions to problems that have never been solved.
I prefer optimism combined with pragmatism. Believing in yourself is great, but you also need to take steps towards your goals. If something doesn’t work, try something else. Pessimism is just moping. At the end of the day, it doesn’t help to acomplish anything.
As they say, “Wish in one hand, shit in the other and see which one fills up first.”
I don’t see pessimism as meaning you don’t try. I see it as meaning you have to try because if you don’t, things will only get worse. I also see it as being about preparing for the worst and not relying on anything to save you.
There’s optimism, realism/pragmatism, and pessimism, and the latter two are frequently confused.
Optimist: “I don’t need to cut back on spending. I’ll get a new job so quickly I won’t even notice!”
Pessimist: “What’s the point of getting out of bed at all? I won’t ever find a job.”
Pragmatist: “If I’m going to keep on living, I need to find a new job. It’s possible, but it’ll take some work. Until I do, I need to save as much money as possible since I don’t know when I’ll get a job.”
Optimists don’t recognize dangers and problems, and pessimists don’t recognize hope and other good things. Pragmatists are the “hope for the best, plan for the worst” crowd, acknowledging the reality of a situation, good or bad, while still working to the good.
By those definitions, I’m a pragamatist. It’s the Pollyanna “I know things will work out for the best” outlook that strikes me as naive and self-destructive.
Most people are, though there’s variance up and down the continuum. The confusion comes when cynics down at the pessimistic end of the continuum insist that their doomsaying is just being realistic. I generally hang out around cynics and pragmatists more than optimists, but I can’t ever recall an optimist insisting that their view matched reality in the way pessimists do.
Why would it take your mind off your fears? Why would you put any credence in what the person said about whether “everything will work out” or not? How would they know?
I dunno. You could just as easily ask why would I be crying to someone about a problem that they have no ability to fix. Sometimes venting makes you feel better and sometimes being reassured does too. Even if the person doing the reassuring has no authority to promise you anything. As has been pointed out, usually it’s a combination of optimism and pragmatism that makes this the most effective.
To give another example, a friend of mine just went through a stressful career transition. He was worried about floundering and expressed that to me. I told him that I’d feel the same way if I were in his shoes, but knowing him, I believed that things would sort themselves out soon. And if they didn’t, then we would have to think of a Plan B and work to make that okay as well.
How could I know that things would sort themselves out soon? There was no way for me to know this since I’m not omnipresent, but to me it doesn’t matter. He didn’t come to me with his worry looking for an critical appraisal of everything that could go wrong and right. He also is smart enough to not need any advice. All he was looking for was some comfort. Fuzzy stuff. Nothing factual.
Maybe I didn’t help make him feel better, but he seemed to cheer up after I talked to him. There’s no accounting for psychology. It’s not always a rational thing.
Overall, I agree. But I don’t think you’re giving optimism a fair portrayal. This is how I see the three when faced with an identical problem:
Optimist: Drat! Yet another problem I must deal with. Well, I better get to it right away. Doing X, Y, and Z will probably fix it in a jiffy, yessir!
Pessimist: Shit! Yet another damn problem!! Well, I’m not bothering with it. It’s a hopeless situation and it’s a waste of time to even think about it.
Pragmitist: Crap! Yet another problem on my plate. Is it worth worrying about right now? It could probably wait a few days, but still. Let’s see…I can do X, Y, and Z and see if that will work. And if they don’t, then I’m going to give up on it. It’s really not that important in the grand scheme of things.
I think the Optimist and the Pragmatist are somewhat similar in their attitudes, it’s just that The Optimist will not give up, even when that may very well be the answer (like working a job they hate based on the slim chance that things will eventually get better). The Pragmatist doesn’t have his ego tied up into his problems as much as the Optimist does, so he doesn’t feel like such a failure if he decides a problem isn’t fixable…at least by him. However, because the Pragmatist can easily detach from problems that seem unfixable or not important, sometimes she or he can overestimate their insurmountability (just like the Optimitist can underestimate them). They are the ones who have regrets for not having done or tried such-and-such, while the Optimist can usually say, “Well, at least I did that.”
In terms of problem-solving, I’ve always tended towards pragmatism, because I’m a low-key, laid-back person by nature and most problems that I encounter don’t seem that important to me, including the ones in my personal life. For instance, right now the flapper in my toliet isn’t sealing correctly, so I’ve got a slow leak of money going down the drain every month. But desite the fact that I’m generally very frugal, I keep putting off fixing the problem because it just doesn’t seem pressing enough. This is a lazy-ass style. So I’ve started to see the virtue in being an Energizer-Bunny type problem-solver, someone who cares enough to expend that extra energy to fix whatver “broken” thing comes along. I guess you could say I’m trying to cultivate an approach to life that’s optimistically pragmatic.
Whoo hoo, a thread on one of my pet peeves!
One thing I REALLY hate – the idea that people, and especially little kids, are “heroes” because they are ill, getting some difficult treatment, and still alive. I could just punch out Sully Sullivan every time I see that PSA he does for the children’s hospital.
The other people I want to punch out, were all the people who said to me, when I was about to be laid off, “When one door closes, another opens” and, “This will turn out to be the best thing that could have happened to you.”
Fuck you all, with a broomstick. (No offense, Broomstick)
Close.
2007: Miami
2008: Detroit
2009: St. Louis
Either way, the question may not be great, but I believe in the underlying point.
Well I haven’t read that book, but the premise sounds really silly. Blind faith or superstition can certainly be dangerous, if it overrules common sense (the man ignoring the rescue boat to wait for God dies, and God says but I sent you a rescue boat!), but positive thinking as an addition to ration thinking can pretty much be only a good thing.
I’m not buying it. At most, positive thinking might have negligible physical value (but it’s emotional value should not be ignored). I can’t imagine it having any serious detriment in the general population.
[quote=“monstro, post:1, topic:554213”]
Basically, she thinks Americans have been programmed to view the world as something they can control solely with their thoughts. If you want the world (or your life) to be a certain way, all you have to do is have the right “mind frame” and everything will come into place for you.
[QUOTE]
This sounds more like the book “The Secret”.
Can you give some concrete examples?
Well, that’s true. Not because of magic, but 1) the general placebo effect and 2) stress inhibits health, and negativity causes stress.
What the hell is wrong with not wanting to be depressed about your appearance on top of the horribleness of the cancer itself?
And what proactive actions, specifically, are people neglecting when they are busy thinking positively?
That’s not a very good study. All that shows is that people don’t go to support groups if they already are in a supportive enough environment. And “not a better outcome” does not equal your suggested “worser outcome”.
If it’s a façade, then it isn’t really positive thinking. People shouldn’t suppress the natural negative emotions they already have, but they shouldn’t dwell on them either. They should express them and move past them. Positive thinking isn’t about repression.
That would obviously create unneeded stress. But “people are doing something stupid and calling it positive thinking” isn’t “positive thinking itself is bad”.
You can find seminars for any point along the continuum of practical to abstract. Each has it’s potential merits and pitfalls. A great attitude obviously won’t suffice alone in the absence of action, but dry practical advice isn’t very helpful without the right motivation and attitude to put it into practice.
Is anyone really advising that?
Yes it is at least in part specifically a response to “The Secret”, and all that affirmation crap.
And yes, people are ALWAYS walking up to sad looking people and telling them. “Smile!”, or that everything will work out for the best.
Oh, well if that is the case, then we can save a lot of money by no longer controlling for placebo effect in medical trials…yet double blind trials continue to be the gold standard for establishing efficacy.
It is not moral character, but patients do need to take meds that cause nausea and only raise the odds but do not guarantee a cure. They need to agree to operations that MIGHT cure them, but that WILL leave them disfigured, neutered, mute, mentally limited, or shitting into a bag for life. They need to sleep to help their bodies fight the disease in spite of the demons that haunt whenever they close their eyes. They need to battle with insurance companies who would rather they died quickly or at least cheaply. They need to choose these things, and endure pain and fatigue when certain relief is only an overdose or bullet away.
These are things a “brave” person who “battles” cancer does, and every one of these things improves the odds of survival. If you know of any research indicating that pessimism improves survival rates, please fight my ignorance.
That has been my experience. When someone asks, “How are you”, they really don’t want to hear anything other than “I’m fine”, because it makes them uncomfortable and they will find a reason to change the subject as soon as possible if you tell them how crappy you feel.
To be fair, though, dude on the street doesn’t ask “how are you?” with the expectation that someone will start gushing about how great their life is because they woke up to a gorgeous spouse, a million dollar home, and pancakes for breakfast, either. Bragging makes us uncomfortable too. “How are you?” really isn’t meant to elicit a truthful response, because a little more than “fine” can quickly turn into TMI.
That’s what I’ve found to be true, too. Of course, people aren’t going to admit to not wanting to hear the truth (that one really isn’t “fine”), because that makes them seem like non-empathetic asses. But because we’re all dealing with shit and we’re all expected to just deal with it like it’s no big deal, then “I’m fine” is our way of conforming. A person who diverges from this is being a “grouch” or a “complainer”.
Lately I’ve been trying to be as honest as I can without being a Debbie Downer. If someone asks me how I’m doing, I’ll say, “I’m making it alright, I guess.” Or “I’m hanging in there.” Fundamentally, I suppose, they are not that much different than “I’m fine.” However, they make me feel like I’m giving myself more of a honest portrayal.