Feb 3, 2011
What is optimism and who is an optimist?
Optimism: Disposition to hope for the best or look on the bright side of things; general tendency to take a favourable view of circumstances or prospects.
Optimist: One who is inclined to practical optimism; one disposed, with or without sufficient reason, to hope for the best or think favourably of circumstances.
The above definitions wouldn’t be complete without comparing it with pessimism.
Pessimism: The tendency or disposition to look at the worst aspect of things; the habit of taking the gloomiest view of circumstances.
Pessimist: One who habitually takes the worst view of things.
Drawing a comparison between the two - it is said, tongue in cheek, that an optimist sees daylight at the end of the tunnel, whereas a pessimist sees the headlights of an oncoming train.
Optimists believe that every cloud has a silver lining, while pessimists just see the potential for rain.
Optimists believe that every cloud has a silver lining, while pessimists just see the potential for rain.
O: Own (Count) your Blessings
Analyse these statistics - If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof overhead and a place to sleep … you’re richer than 75% in this world; If you have money in the bank, in your wallet and spare change at some place … you are among the top 8% of the world’s wealthy; If you woke up this morning with more health than illness … you are more blessed than the thousands who will not survive this week; If you have never experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of torture or the pangs of starvation … you are ahead of 500 million people in this world.
It is not always easy to recognise the things in our lives for which we should be thankful. When you compare, do so with the less privileged … for we would realise then… how gifted we are! ‘I had complained and cried that I had no shoes until I saw a man without feet’ would be an apt quotation by Anonymous to reflect again and again.
My good old friend Lorraine (name changed) was happy and contended in her married life. Her husband, a banker, was posted in Amritsar in Punjab in the late eighties at the height of Sikh militancy. One day, she woke up to the news that the terrorists had boarded a bus, took all the non-Sikhs out and shot them at point-blank range after having their eyes and hands tied. Little did she know that one amongst them killed was her dear husband who was posted in the bank’s branch there. It was a shock out of the blue, the whole world suddenly turned upside down, but being an optimist, she gradually bounced back. She gained an entry into the bank and built a successful career. With her only daughter she rebuilt her life with efficiency. I count on the daily blessings in my life, she said when I had met her the last time in the late nineties. My in-laws family and my own sisters have been a pillar of strength. My colleagues and friends have given me constant support. Time is the greatest healer and I am really blessed. Time heals: what seems unendurable today will never feel quite as bad in the future.
P: Persistence and Hope
“Be a looker-forward and not a looker-back, be a presser-onward upon life’s stony track, don’t waste time regretting the things you cannot mend. Anticipate good fortune at every twist and bend.”
Hope is the device that optimists use to propel themselves into the future. Optimism inspires hope and persistence because optimists live with hope. We also attract life’s riches when we hope and persist in pursuing our goals.
There is an incredible story of a young girl who survived the earthquake that struck Gujarat in 2001. She had lost her kith and kin and everything but was thankful that she had survived. From her hospital bed, the girl Prutha Desai spoke about how such things happen in life on which we have no control and has to be taken into stride. Instantly, I knew this optimistic girl would reach glorious heights. She was born on India’s Independence Day 1988 and reborn on India’s Republic Day 2001 and was rescued after 36 hours by having her right arm amputated from the debris of a collapsed apartment. When I lost track of her achievements in 2003, she had won nearly 200 medals and certificates in paintings nationally and internationally apart from having many painting exhibitions, drawing in her left hand. The picture of her presenting paintings to the then American President Bill Clinton in April 2001 is still fresh in my mind.
Of course, no-one is always optimistic and happy about everything. Unwanted things happen and we feel unhappy for a while … that’s normal. Optimistic people have highs and lows, yet they are in the high end most of the time. Choosing to be hopeful when it feels as if everything is going against you is not easy, but it’s possible and we have seen that in Prutha’s case.
I have been to a couple of cricket and hockey matches involving arch rivals India and Pakistan. The way the Pakistani fans group themselves in different parts of the stadium waving their country’s flag, cheering their team even when the chips are down is something to be commended. In more occasions than not, buoyed by this support, their team has pulled up impossible victories virtually coming from nowhere.
T: Trust in your Ability
A man is but the product of his thoughts, what he thinks … that he becomes. No attribute is more precious to the optimist than his or her self-confidence. By thinking right and trusting in your ability to do what needs to be done, you enter into all your undertakings in the expectation of success. Expecting to succeed is a powerful motivator and helps you to persist even in the face of difficulties. And of course, positive expectations tend to lead to positive results.
This is a story where an Australian woman who lost her legs during a terrorist attack in London over five years ago has wrapped up a 435 km trek in England. Gill Hicks, who suffered horrific injuries when suicide attacks hit London tube trains and buses in 2005, completed the 30 day walk on prosthetic limbs on August 17, 2008. The then 38 year old was hailed by one and all and cheered by her supporters far and wide.
We have also seen in Daiji columns, incredible stories of people who have pulled through astonishing achievements overcoming the difficulties they had to endure.
Friends from different cultural backgrounds but optimists all:
An optimist sees an opportunity in every difficulty but a pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity.
Friends from different cultural backgrounds but optimists all:
An optimist sees an opportunity in every difficulty but a pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity.
I: Inside Out
“Success is failure turned inside out. The silver tint of the clouds of doubt … and you never can tell how close you are, it may be near when it seems afar. So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit. It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.” This is a phrase I had read in ‘Competition Success Review’ when I was young that has got stuck in my mind ever since.
There is no person in this world who has never met a failure, not even the greatest and most successful. The secret is that the successful people didn’t lose their confidence after experiencing failure. If at all, the failures stimulated them even more. You will find optimism before success in the Dictionary which holds perfectly well. Research shows that in most cases it is an optimistic attitude that paves the way for success rather than the other way round.
Consider this true story: At the age of sixty-six, Harland Sanders had to auction off everything he owned in order to pay his debts. Once the successful proprietor of a large restaurant, Sanders saw his business suffer from the construction of a new freeway that bypassed his Establishment and re-routed the traffic that had formerly passed. With an income of only $105 a month in Social Security, he packed his car with a pressure cooker, some chickens and sixty pounds of the seasoning that he had developed for frying chicken. He stopped at restaurants, where he cooked chicken for owners to sample. If they liked it, he offered to show them how to cook it. Then he sold them the seasoning and collected a royalty of four cents on each chicken they cooked. The rest is history. Eight years later, there were 638 Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises and Colonel Sanders had sold his business again – this time for over two million dollars.
The next time you flick on the light switch, thank Thomas Alva Edison and his ability to overcome setbacks. Edison experimented more than 10,000 times before producing the first incandescent light bulb in 1879. Everytime you meet with a failure, believe you have another chance and try again, at the end of it all - success would be yours.
M: Managing Yourself
You are the master of your own destiny. No-one can take that away from you. It all depends on how well you manage yourself and if you manage it well, there is no stopping YOU! It could be managing anything in life … the most important among them could be your health. As with so many aspects of the mind-body connection, if you believe that you are healthy, your health will actually benefit. And if you are healthy, you will feel healthy.
An optimist thinks forward and creates opportunities even out of hopeless situations. My right hand was giving me a bit of trouble so much so I could not lift it either way beyond 45 degrees apart from having a painful sensation especially at night that was troubling my sleep. Time had come to fly to India on vacation and as a result thought I would seek doctor’s advice once I was back. In India, it took turn for the worse. Unable to bear, I went for treatment at a prestigious Catholic hospital at the outskirts of Bangalore. Initially, visited a General Physician (GP), who recommended that I see an Orthopaedist after having an X’ray done on my troubled hand. I took a special appointment to see the Orthopaedist who hailed from our neighbouring State. He just took a couple of minutes to look at my X-ray, barely listened to what I had to say and concluded that I needed to get admitted to the hospital for a week for a surgery. On pressing for the reason he stated, at the joint of the arm and the shoulder there has been some extra growth that is obstructing the free movement of the hand causing pain. He lifted my hand 90 degrees twice to prove the point that there indeed is a friction at the joint and with age it could get worse, he warned. Do you think I collapsed? Remember I am an optimist … of course, I did not go ahead.
Once in Mangalore, I decided to have two more opinions. The Doctor in Mangalore looking at the X-ray instantly advised it was a wrong diagnosis as everything was fine. After conducting a few tests in his Clinic, informed he knew what it was and wanted me to have a blood test done for uric acid just to make 100 percent sure. Once that was done, he advised it was to do something with spondylitis, the pain coming from the back and there were tablets to cure it and a bit of care to be taken later too. Fifteen day course of 4 different tablets did the trick and now a year later all is well. I did not even have to take the third opinion.
In another case, a patient had a chronic disease. The family doctor knew his patient of many years would not survive beyond 6 months with this ailment. However, when the patient enquired to know as to how long he would live, the optimist Doctor advised that he would live for at least 5 years if not more. The optimist patient passed away after 8 glorious years.
I: Immersing Yourself
Each one is brilliant in this world in his/her own right. Some get it instantly and others take a bit of time to master the same. If you immerse yourself, you would know what your worth is - for you would be surprised to find out for yourself you could perform and complete such a task. Sometimes it requires a challenge from others to bring that out. As St. Francis of Assisi says “Start by doing what is necessary, then what is possible and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”
The last time the Indian Cricket team was Downunder before the one day series could begin, the Mangalorean born television commentator Sanjay Manjrekar strongly criticised master-batsman Sachin Tendulkar in his column saying that the batsman has never been a match-winner for India. He had some ammunition in saying this as in the Tests that preceded, Sachin was just one of ‘those batsmen.’ Sachin took it as a challenge immersing himself to the task and let his bat do the talking without saying a word. Putting all doubts to rest that he has never been a match-winner, single-handedly won the ODI series for India inspite of suffering from a groin injury during the later stages.
This goes on to prove that the things you are looking for is within yourself. With the right attitude you can prove or put to use at the right time. The prediction that is most likely to influence whether we succeed or fail is the one that we make about our ability to succeed – a measure known as self-efficacy. The same Tendulkar when he was in the West Indies the last time was a near failure … the great West Indian batsman Vivian Richards was quoted as saying that Tendulkar was fighting with his own devils. Once he got over that by immersing himself, he emerged again as an undisputed winner.
An optimist sees the beautiful roses and pessimist the thorns.
An optimist sees the beautiful roses and pessimist the thorns.
S: Self-talk Positive:
When you cling to the past, the present becomes difficult and the future seems impossible. As Denis E. Waitley the best-selling author, speaker, poet and lyricist says - Relentless, repetitive self-talk is what changes our self-image.
Man is the only creature to whom God has given wisdom and it is upto us to use that wisdom appropriately. Your most important conversations are the ones you conduct with yourself. Self-talk governs your emotional state, which in turn affects your mental and physical well-being. To give my own example. When a problematic situation arises, I think it through patiently, carefully and thoroughly analysing it over and over again. Sometimes in doing so, I close the door and talk loudly with myself, go off alone for a walk where I can do the same. I can understand (myself) better by talking out loud. I never build a case against myself. I do not remember from where I learnt it but it has helped me to bounce back all along from the hopeless of cases. I have always started by saying to myself: “This has happened. It should never have. It’s unfortunate but I cannot do much about it … ” and draw a line and that takes half of your burden away as you seek to damage control worrying about the future.
Other sentences that could give you a kick start would be: “Oh well, so what, I didn’t need it anyway. There’ll be other opportunities.” “Oh, no! I messed it up again. I keep on doing that.” “OK, so I lost face over that deal. But it’s not the end of the world. I’ll get it right next time.” The process is simple: Stop destructive self-talk and create optimistic self-talk stories. Feel more hopeful and act according to the situation. Act to affect the situation. The same thing would hold good if you are discussing with yourself a future course of action as well.
T: Tuning our thinking with the Greats
Great people who have lived their life to the full and gone before us have a lot to offer. Strictly speaking, they are not dead, but are living for generations. By their experiences, we can take out a leaf and modify our lives and live it out successfully. One of the best ways to express ourselves is to follow great men and women. Having lived and experienced life before us, they have left their rich experiences so that we may benefit from them. Just like we follow the advice from our parents as we know they tell that for our betterment, similarly the experiences of great people is worth emulating. Many of the quotations that I have come across have changed my thinking, attitude and life. By my experiences of life today, I have my own set of quotations as well.
I am just quoting a few here that have influenced me:
“Our greatest glory lies not in falling but in rising everytime we fall.” - Confucius
“Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.” - William James
“All the strength and success you want is within you. Therefore make your own future.” - Swami Vivekananda
“When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” – Helen Keller
Critics of course would beg to differ with ‘optimism’ because of their share of experiences in life and might even tend to say a person who says he is an optimist is a fool. They may dub him as a guy who tells you to cheer up when things are going his way. This is because life has not been kind to them due to circumstances. My good friend in Abu Dhabi, UAE - Anoop (name changed) says there is no point in being an optimist as whatever he does in life is doomed to fail. He believes in ‘karma’ whereby the actions of his past life is dictating terms in his present life of which he has no control. Another friend of mine here in Australia who lost his father at a very young age leaving him to tend to his mother and five siblings argues …life has always been a dark cave … the word optimist does not exist in my dictionary. I am more realistic, he opines.
Critics apart, I firmly believe being an optimist will cut you out of the rest. It is not that optimism solves all of life’s problems; it is just that it can sometimes make the difference between coping and collapsing.
Optimism is such a powerful tool because it gives you the confidence to handle both positive and negative events. It enables you to approach situations with assurance, persistence and an expectation of success. Being optimistic means that you have a natural aptitude for happiness, that you can manage your perspective and that you take an active role in creating the life you want. The statistics on the power of optimism are staggering. Studies clearly show that optimists possess the ability to excel academically, professionally and in sports, to resist infectious illnesses and chronic diseases and to overcome life’s setbacks quickly and without fear.
Optimists are not born, they are eventually made. At the same time – a gentle caution … do not be an extreme optimist. That would ruin you. Anything extreme in life has always proved to be disastrous.
Our life is a Book of Chapter Three -
The past, the present and the yet to be!
The past is gone forever, never to return
The present we live with everyday and learn
The future is still in our hands
Though exactly not for us to see
But by learning to be an optimist…
We can live the rest of our lives with glee!
I would leave you with a real life incident that I had read somewhere. A press reporter was attending the birthday party of a 99-year-old industrialist. After the party was over and he was about to take leave, he reached the old man and said: “I hope I can come back next year and see you reach 100.” There isn’t any reason why you shouldn’t young man,” replied the old man, “You look quiet healthy to me.”
Even if you are lucky to live for a 100 years, it would be just a little over 36,500 days in total, a chunk of which we have already lived through. We do not know when, where and how we would say good-bye to this world. When we finally bid adieu, leave alone taking with us our possessions, money or whatever we had accumulated during our lifetime - someone else has to carry and place us at our final resting place. We cannot even walk to that place ourselves.
Remember, today is the first day of the rest of your life. A half-empty glass can become half-full; a hardship to endure can become a challenge to overcome. By learning to be an optimist, you can change your mind and change your life. My wish for you is that optimism becomes your constant companion – a fine companion indeed.
LIVE LIFE – Be an optimist and it pays
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