THE POWER OF OPTIMISM

PAUSE A MOMENT

THE REMARKABLE POWER OF OPTIMISM

Good evening once again and welcome to Pause a Moment. Tonight I want to remind you of the remarkable recuperative powers of Optimism.

[A Cockeyed Optimist – Barbra Streisand]

Whether you reach success or failure in life has little to do with your circumstances; it has much more to do with your attitude...with your faithful courage...with your choices and decisions! Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, noted “If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it, and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”
 

People who see themselves as non-achievers blame their circumstances; achievers engage with and emerge from their circumstances. Some concentrate on the blank walls that box them in; achievers always look beyond the walls for a way to get under them, over them, around them, or just go through them.

Here's a nonsense riddle that shed some light on a dark corner of my lousy self-image some years ago. I warn you it doesn't make rational sense – it's not supposed to --- it works out-of-sight at some other level, until one day you'll suddenly "get it". Here it is....

A goose has been raised all its life in a large glass jar. The goose has now grown too large for the jar, but the neck is too narrow for it to get out. Question:= How do we get the goose out of the jar, without damaging either the goose or the jar?

Answer:= [Snap your fingers] The goose is out. That's it. The goose is out.

[Actually it was never in the jar; I was mistaken about that.]

It's that simple. Now forget it. You can't work it out; just let it be. Complexity is Fraud. Simplicity is the Name, Complexity is the Game. One day you'll get it.

This wasn't the first time in my life when I've felt myself walled up in a prison cell and left the keys on the outside. I'm sure you know how that feels, too. The first key to getting outside is to realise – not to hope, but to realise -- that there IS an outside, and that “outside” has a few important things going for it that you cannot get “inside”. Of course, logic and reason will tell you “Of course there's an outside – silly billy!” but logic and reason are of very little practical use when you're sinking deeper and deeper into the prison of some seemingly bottomless emotional funk.

The second key is to wake up to the fact that the way out of an emotional prison often looks worse than the situation you're in. This is why so few people take it on. Victims whinge “I have no choice” when the truth is that the ability to choose and change your choices is always present, but not always obvious or attractive. For example, the way out of a rigid, righteous certainty is through Uncertainty – hmmm. The way out of compulsive argumentative opposition is through Surrender – oh, no! The way out of Resentment is through Forgiveness. Yeccchhh!!! Everything in you rebels against doing the very thing that will free you. You forget that doing what looked and felt “right” got you into the mess in the first place.

So, it comes back to the hoary old question – do you want to go on being “right”, or would you rather be free? Have you had enough suffering yet? Would you rather be “right” or “Successful”? Right? OK. Knock yourself out, but don't expect me to join you.

Turning your back on rightness doesn't make you wrong, by the way; it does show you want something more than a cosy corner in the Smug.

Optimism is a choice – one of many Options that are available to all but those afflicted most severely by mental illness. For example, my daughter, who suffers from severe brain damage, still knows that Optimism has to be chosen. I define Optimism as a way of being in the world that realistically recognises and optimises the Benefits and Advantages inherent in every situation, and that identifies ways to effectively employ your particular traits, abilities and strengths towards a result that works for you, and strengthens the rest of the cast around you. The key word is “effective”. I stand for a world that works. Anything that no longer works – I ditch it. Know differently. Choose differently. Do differently. If you keep doing what you've always done, you'll keep getting what you've always got.

Here's a Ruthless Rule of Reality – You choose how to live every day of your life. Whatever situation you're in right now is the result of a series of events that have happened, and the choices you have made in dealing with what's happened. What happens to you now and from here onward depends on the same interaction of Chance and Choosing. If you keep making the same Choices today as the ones you've made in the past, chances are you'll keep getting pretty much the same results. You don't have to be an Einstein to figure that out. Isn't it possibly slightly nuts to keep on doing the same things and expecting different results? Don't feel too badly, though; it's an insanity we all share to a greater or lesser degree.

[Tomorrow Is Another Day – Louise Anton]

So what stops us from using the opportunities that Today offers for changing tomorrow? The Law of Inertia. The law of inertia holds that a body at rest tends to remain at rest, and a body in motion tends to remain in motion, at the same speed and in the same direction, unless the body is acted upon by an outside force.

That same Law of Inertia applies very well to patterns in our lives....

People who are successful tend to remain successful.
People who are happy tend to remain happy.
People who are respected tend to remain respected.
People who reach their goals tend to go on reaching their goals.

So what's the major difference between the physics and the psychology of this?

In physics, inertia is controlled by outside forces; but in a context of psychology the real changes in the directions of our lives come from inside us. As William James said, "The greatest discovery of my generation is that a person can alter his life by altering his attitude of mind."

You can live every day of your life. You can be alive to the tips of your fingers. You can accomplish virtually any worthwhile goal you set for yourself. So what do you need to change that will get you what you want?

[Tomorrow Never Knows – Tangerine Dream]

Changing your Attitude has the potential to change your life for the better. Whether you are an optimist or a pessimist, the choice as to how you will be today and tomorrow is yours, and yours alone. You know the old computing cliché “Garbage In / Garbage Out”? All your tomorrows depend entirely on the content, the context and the energetic quality of what you pour into your here and now.

You've heard the saying “We become what we eat” and any attempt to improve your physical health has to encompass an improvement in your diet. In much the same way any project to raise the levels of your emotional and spiritual health should include a thorough overhaul of the kind of stuff you feed your brain, your mind and your soul.

That's up to you. If you need a helping hand, you'll find one on the end of each of your own arms.