6 Ways to Nurture Optimism

Economists, when reproached for making gloomy forecasts, will sometimes reply that pessimism is simply optimism tempered by reality. And while it’s true that their predictions tend to be conservative, prioritizing risks and contingencies, when all is said and done, an economist’s job when making their calculations is to take into account uncertainty, a factor never to be underestimated.

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Entrepreneurs, on the other hand, are generally seen as compulsive optimists. And even within companies, certain clichés are often associated with particular functions: CFOs tend to see the glass as half-empty, while strategists, sales and marketing teams are typically glass-half-full types.

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How would you describe yourself: optimistic or pessimistic? Philosophy can lend us a hand here, from two thinkers who held very different views of the world, the German Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and the French Fran?ois-Marie Arouet, better known by his pseudonym Voltaire.

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Leibniz is one of the fathers of modern logic and a reference of rationalism. One of the central tenets of his philosophy is "metaphysical optimism", the thesis that God has created the best of all possible worlds. This is so because one of the attributes of divinity is perfection and therefore, logically, any of the Creator's works must be perfect. According to this approach, calamities such as earthquakes, epidemics or floods, while regrettable, can only be understood in the broadest of contexts, difficult for human beings, with our finite capacity, to grasp.

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You may know people who share this alacrity in the face of the events that humanity experiences, both happy and tragic. The existence of hardships and disasters, their unpredictable character and the absence of justifiable reasons, from a moral point of view, is one of the most difficult challenges for believers to understand.

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And it is precisely metaphysical optimism that Voltaire turns his sights on in his novel Candide, whose title expresses the candor and innocence of its protagonist. In his youth, Candide experiences disappointment in love, after which he embarks on a journey around the world during which he undergoes many experiences, accompanied by Dr. Pangloss, a wise man who sees everything that happens on their travels as opportunities to transfer a unique lesson to his disciple. Parodying Leibniz's thesis, Pangloss concludes at the end of each adventure that we live in the best of all possible worlds. In their travels they witness myriad deaths, wars, calamities, religious persecution and slavery. And in every instance, Pangloss sums up the situation with the mantra that, despite all these evils, we live in the best of all possible worlds.

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One of the episodes in the book takes place in Lisbon, coinciding with the earthquake that hit the Portuguese capital in 1755, followed by a tsunami and widespread fires, which devastated the city and left thousands dead. It is likely that this event prompted Voltaire to questions his own religious convictions. While a skeptic, Voltaire did not consider himself an atheist, instead preferring deism, the belief that divinity is to be found in nature, which at bottom is not far from Leibniz's view.

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At the end of his wanderings, Candide meets his youthful love again, both older and disillusioned with life, and they decide to rebuild their lives and run a farm. Another of the characters, Martin, states that the best way to make existence bearable is to stop philosophizing and devote oneself to the tasks that provide a livelihood. Pangloss again drones on about how all the experiences they have lived through make for the best of all possible worlds, to which Candide responds expeditiously: "il faut cultiver notre jardin" (let's cultivate our garden), which in modern parlance might be rendered as “let's cut the crap".

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It is easy to sympathize with Candide’s mature pragmatism, particularly in light of what he has lived through, along with Pangloss’s banal positivity. At the same time, we know the advantages of philosophy in our lives, and how, as Socrates pointed out, a life without scrutiny is meaningless.

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Candide’s proposal recalls a maxim enshrined as a principle of life in the Benedictine monasteries in the Middle Ages: ora et labora (pray and work). The abbots wanted to prevent their monks from spending too much time praying and to also focus on tasks that supported their community such as working in the library or the apothecary, preparing meals, gardening and tending to the animals. Ora et labora represented the balance required between reflection, analysis and philosophizing, and action, work and daily life.?????

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Reading Candide, we inevitably feel antipathy towards the insensitive redundancies of Pangloss, and instead identify with the protagonist, a model of sanity and realism. And while it seems as though the optimists are deluded and we should be content to live from day to day, thinking only of our material needs, in all honesty, Leibniz’s argument of the best of all possible worlds is based on logic, not on a justification of the morality or fairness of the things that happen in the world, for which we rarely find reasonable explanations.

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I would argue that the caricature of Pangloss in Voltaire's work misrepresents the advantages of being optimistic, of being happier or living better. Over the course of the pandemic we have seen the benefits of exercising hope, optimism and resilience. Without hope, it is difficult to think of new projects or make plans for the future. Hopelessness leads to apathy, and although it can sometimes appear closer to pragmatism and realism, as seems to be the case with Candide, it has the pernicious effect of generating indifference toward what is valuable, what is difficult to achieve, and that gives meaning to life.?

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We know from experience the benefit of hanging out with optimists, and most of us have learned to avoid pessimistic and mistrustful people.

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Like other habits that shape our character, I believe that hope and optimism are virtues that are best developed through repeated actions, and therefore constancy and sportsmanship -knowing how to start over again and again- are essential. But optimism is also an attitude towards life. It leads us to see the positive side of things, not because we repeat it insistently as Pangloss did, but because it teaches us to learn from setbacks, preparing us to face the next trial better prepared.

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Daniel Kahneman, Nobel Prize-winning economist and psychologist, is very clear: "If you were allowed one wish for your child, seriously consider wishing him or her optimism. Optimists are normally cheerful and happy, and therefore popular; they are resilient in adapting to failures and hardships, their chances of clinical depression are reduced, their immune system is stronger, they take better care of their health, they feel healthier than others and are in fact likely to live longer".

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How to cultivate the healthy mental athleticism of optimism without falling into the cloying and unconscious platitudes satirized by Voltaire? Below are a few helpful, practical tips.???

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• Avoid negativity. Some people think that saying "no" is a virtue. However, systematically rejecting new opportunities, refusing to take part in initiatives or being closed to different approaches mean we end up doing little else than tending our own garden, like Voltaire's Candide. In contrast, keeping an open attitude to new options and proposals, and believing that the default answer is affirmative makes you a more positive and optimistic person.?

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• Cultivate a sense of humor. In several articles published on LinkedIn I have explored the thaumaturgical effects of a sense of humor in all areas of our life. Good humor is the little brother of optimism, and practicing it generates a favorable state of mind, mentally and physically.

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• Socialize more frequently. Closing oneself off and avoiding contact with other people tends to make us more self-absorbed, which is a breeding ground for pessimism. On the contrary, meeting other people, widening our circle of acquaintances, worrying about their problems, sharing their ambitions, participating in their joys, and also in their failures or misfortunes, develops their humanity and the understanding that many of our problems are common and perhaps less serious than those endured by others.

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• Set yourself ambitious challenges, as long as they are imaginable and achievable, even if they are difficult to reach. Entrepreneurs, by nature dreamers and visionaries, tend to be optimists. Conformism, on the other hand, breeds apathy and results in paralysis.

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• Avoid criticizing people. It’s a good idea to practice constructive criticism, particularly at work. The use of critical capacity—one of the most highly valued professional skills—helps combat groupthink and enables us to challenge preconceived ideas and promote innovation.That said, criticizing people, rather than what they say, tends to create an unsettled working environment and potentially can turn you into an unhelpful and unreliable colleague.I remember the title of the title song of a Broadway musical about the American comedian Will Rogers, which went Never met a man I didn't like, taken from the title of his memoirs. In other words, look for the positive side of everyone you meet.

• Exercise humility, a quality that has nothing to do with weakness, but as Socrates said, with understanding: in reality, we know nothing; there is still much to learn and to rectify, regardless of age, experience or the position we occupy.Lack of humility leads some intelligent people who have not met their expectations, generally due to their own responsibility, to feel resentment, a close relative of pessimism. They blame others for their failures, believing they have not received the recognition they deserve. Resentment is avoidable, because there is always time to start practicing humility.?

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Finally, while there is no denying that luck plays an important role in our lives, it seems that optimists enjoy better luck, I wonder why that might be??

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