The pessimist complains about the wind; The optimist expects it to change; The realist adjusts the candles.
William George Ward
Check out this short video where they show us how we can be more optimistic.
In this video, Elsa Punset gives us some tools for us to be more optimistic in life:
Pessimists and optimists make very different interpretations of the positive and negative events that occur in their interaction with the world:
1) The pessimists They tend to think that what happened, if it is positive, has a temporary, momentary nature and they see it as the result of something that escapes their hands and does not depend on them. If the result is negative, they think it will last a long time and they see it all black, holding themselves solely responsible for everything that happened.
2) The way of perceiving optimistic people works differently, They are capable of having a realistic attitude (adjusting the sails) but also hopeful (realizing that everything ends up happening). Basically the difference is in confidence, the belief that I can count on my resources and that everything happens for a reason that will facilitate my learning and development.
Optimism helps us face difficulties as challenges, challenges that the realistic person assumes and in which he perseveres trusting in our potentialities and capacities as a human being and in the good disposition that others have towards help.
Video: Overcoming an Illness
What are the health effects of one or the other attitude.
"Not even your worst enemies can hurt you as much as your own thoughts"
(Buddha)
The most optimistic people tend to have better mood and health than the negative ones.
Already in Homer's Odyssey it was narrated how joy and optimism were ways of maintaining good health and how they acted as protective shields against multiple diseases.
Modern medicine and recent research point to this fact already described in the Odisea. Let's see what are some of the health effects of one or another attitude:
Negative attitude:
• Disorders of psychological types: Phobic anxiety disorders such as agoraphobia, social phobias, specific or isolated phobias, panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, and mixed anxiety-depressive disorder.
• Excessive intake of alcohol, the consumption of tobacco or psychotropic substances.
• Stress that generates, at the same time, more steroids that weaken the immune system, so there is a greater tendency to get sick.
• Decreased catecholamines and increases the secretion of endorphins, which decreases the activity of the immune system, thus facilitating the disease.
• Bad temper or aggressiveness: serious risk to the heart and brain, which may cause or precipitate strokes or heart attacks.
Optimistic-realistic attitude:
• Decreases symptoms of depression.
• Strengthens the immune system.
• Decreases the appearance of anxiety symptoms.
• Moderate blood pressure.
• Lower levels of distress.
• Higher survival rate than pessimistic patients.
• Prevents cancer.
Now the big question here is where do these attitudes come from, Why are some people more optimistic than others and why do some people keep complaining continuously and seeing everything dark?
Pessimism is basically a conditioned response, learned socially. Negative people often have negative parents or have lived in negative societies and social environments.
How to change our attitude from negative to optimistic.
If the person is interested in reprogram your mind to build a happier mind has to start a process of personal development where he can first observe his mind, his internal characters and his thought patterns that lead him to conform that catastrophic vision of reality and of himself and then introduce changes that allow him to change these ways of thinking that do not favor him that limit you. As the person automates the self-observation of their own thoughts and witnessing them without judging them, they will gradually disidentify from them.
And how do you want to see your glass: half full or half empty? Keep in mind that the will is the first step to action.
A deep hug.