“Power of positive thinking.” “Looking on the bright side.” “Find the silver lining.”
Many of us have heard these quotes as platitudes when faced with life challenges. Today we know they are more than that, and that optimistic people live longer and have a better quality of life! Optimists are happier, healthier and deal with challenges better, improving their overall well-being. Researchers have long identified risk factors for disease states and death but have only begun exploring the emotional and psychological protective factors in aging. According to a 2018 Boston University School of Medicine study, women and men who are optimistic have an 11 to 15% longer lifespan and have 50-70% greater odds of reaching 85 years old. These people are more resilient and better able to regulate stressors and bounce back better from adversity. They also tend to be healthier, engage more consistently with self-care such as exercise, and ultimately believe they can affect their well-being.
Winston Churchill once said," A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
Optimism is hopefulness and confidence that the world is a good place and things will turn out okay. It is not wishful or fantasy thinking but rather a way of looking at what life gives you and believing you have some responsibility for its outcomes. Optimists know that you can impact the outcome of life events. The idea that "it isn't what happens to you but how you respond to what happens to you" is the ultimate optimist mantra, and research backs this up. According to the Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM), the National Center for PTSD at VA Boston Healthcare System, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and the University of Miami Health System (and many others), the benefits of being an optimist include the following:
• Protects against mortality.
• Promotes resilient aging, it’s the best anti-aging drug out there.
• Promotes a longer life span with a 30% chance of living to 85 years and older.
• Improves one’s ability to beat disease, especially cancers.
• Creates overall better health, better quality of life, better relationships. .
• Creates more joy and love in life.
• Improves stress management abilities.
• Decreases perception of stress and its impact.
It is important to know that most people are pessimistic to some degree. Our brains are wired to look out for things that may put us in danger, creating a pattern of pessimistic perceptions that have kept us safe for thousands of years. However, being too good at pessimism can negatively impact your well-being because it causes you only to see the negative options in your life. The good news is that only about 25% of our wiring accounts for our attitudes of optimism or pessimism, and the rest comprises our environment, social support, and learned behaviors. Dr. Martin Seligman, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania and leader of Positive Psychology, believes optimism, like many other skills, can be learned. Dr. Seligman found that people who learned optimism techniques were far less likely to develop depression, anxiety and enjoyed improved overall health.
You CAN Build Optimism:
• Decide to be Optimistic-In every situation remind yourself that you can decide how you
will act and react. And with that knowledge you can choose happiness.
• Thought Stopping Techniques-When you feel the anxiety in the pit of your stomach or
hear the negative thoughts ruminating in your head, learn to stop your thoughts in that
instant. Sing out loud, hum or whistle. This helps break the state of ruminations or
anxiety so you can redirect your thoughts to something positive. Practice this and
eventually you will control your thoughts.
• Replacement Thoughts-Find a happy memory, keep a happiness list or a list of
gratitude’s, or plan a vacation, find something that you can commit to thinking about
when you are feeling anxious or down. One or two minutes of thinking about this will
shift your mood.
• Happiness List/Gratitude List -Many people wait until they have lost weight, or have the
perfect job, or perfect spouse, or whatever they are want, to be happy. Because of this,
they miss out on all the things that make life worth living. Make a list of all the little
things that are good in your life. The automatic toothbrush that feels like a trip to the
dentist, or flying a kite, or brisket with carnalized onions, or anything that brings joy.
Keep the list handy and read it when you are feeling out of sort. You can also write
gratitude’s on this list.
• Avoid Negativity-Limit your time around people or things that bring you
down. The complainers, those that are always sick, who only see what is wrong, or who
put others down will only make you feel worse and will make it hard to be optimistic.
• Change the subject-When someone is stuck on the negative offer up something positive
to talk about, redirect the conversation, or be honest and ask people to participate with
you in changing your attitude. For example, say “Today let’s try this, we each have 5
minutes to talk about our ailments and then we are going to focus on the good things
and see how we feel.”
• Give compliments-Saying something positive to another raises their vibration, it makes
them feel good, and in return will make you feel good. This can be a “thank you” or an
appreciation of a person, place or thing, but stating what it is will always help.
Encouraging optimism in yourself and others can make a big long-term difference. If you are
concerned about being pessimistic yourself, want to learn skills to be more optimistic, or want to learn techniques to help others, reach out to a counselor to help support and guide you today.