The 'Why' and 'How' of Optimism

Hello friend! 👋

Positivity often gets a bad rap, but most people misunderstand it.

It’s often seen as the ‘opposite of negative’, unrealistic, or worse of all, being naive. Yes, there can be a form of unrealistic optimism that is unhealthy (or even toxic positivity), but that’s not the topic today.

Optimism is one of the main pillars of positive psychology.

It is a bias towards taking action to move forward, without wasted effort or energy. I view optimism as a survival mechanism, helping us avoid wasting resources (time and energy for example), on endless ‘what-ifs’.

Worse of all, is the loss of hope for a better reality in the future, due to unrealistic pessimism.

And many people are born pessimists (some like to call themselves realists; as if to justify that life is negative and their pessimism is merely an alignment with reality). But the good news is, that optimism can be trained.

I like to operate with a mix of objective pessimism and realistic optimism (with a bias towards the latter).

Why?

Because science tells us a few things about how positivity can help us create a better life:

1. Positivity opens up creative thinking (rather than the survival mechanism associated with pessimism).

2. Hope can help us reach a new reality, even if the current reality is not supportive of our growth.

3. The more you celebrate, the more there is to celebrate, creating a positive upward spiral

Remember, what you appreciate, appreciates.

So let’s celebrate more, and complain less. While keeping a balance of preparedness for and trust in the future (a balance of objective pessimism and realistic optimism,

Try this today:
1. Set an audacious and wildly important goal that can 10X your life (give yourself permission to dream big).
2. Recall all the many goals you’ve achieved in your life; in school, work, or personal life (and in all ages).
3. Create different pathways and plans to get to that goal (I like to have 3 pathways pre-set so I don’t waste time adjusting if I hit a roadblock).

Positive psychology tells us we don’t spend enough time in point 2.

We tend to quickly jump from one goal to another without stopping to celebrate. So, spend enough time here, the more you list the higher your agency (or confidence) gets - and you need all of it for that big audacious goal.

I believe in you.

Keep positive and have a Super Sunday!

With much joy,

Hashim

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PS. If you made it this far, I too wanted to celebrate something with you today. I’ve just been offered a place for a second masters degree, this time at Oxford and in Mindfulness 😍. It has been a tough process to get in, but here we are!

I look forward to sharing more insights with you as I take on this journey.

PPS. I’ve just returned from a long break, follow me on LinkedIn if you don’t already - I’ll start posting daily again as of tomorrow.