Happy December, fellow optimists! ‘Tis the season of good cheer, glad tidings, and positive wishes for the new year. Indeed, positivity and optimism seem to abound this month. 

However, in case you’re simply “not feelin’ it” and you’re tempted to “pre-Google” this topic, I’ll save you the trouble and provide the spoiler alert: you’re going to find lots (and lots) of articles that pooh-pooh optimism. These articles will tell you that optimism can cause you to set unrealistic, unobtainable goals. Optimism can create depression when things don’t turn out the way you planned. Optimism can ruin your relationships with others, both personally and professionally. Optimism can create “blind spots” in your ability to experience realistic emotions. Trust me, there’s no shortage of blogs and articles telling you to see the glass as half-empty - or completely empty, for that matter.  

This is my opinion: these articles are either talking about what I might call “blind optimism,” i.e., optimism applied across the board, in all circumstances and situations; or they’re touting what I would call “overblown optimism,” i.e., optimism applied hyper-manically, without regard to reality whatsoever. Surely no state of mind, including optimism, should be applied indiscriminately, would you agree? 

But here’s the most important reason why I constantly sing the praises of optimism: no matter how many strikes against optimism you can find out there, the positives most definitely outweigh the negatives - by a long shot! 

So, let’s examine the research-based positives.

Optimists are more likeable. What’s not to like about optimists? Unless you’re Ebenezer Scrooge himself, most of us are drawn to people with sunny dispositions and attitudes that skew toward positive. 

Optimists make other people feel better. Positive attitudes are contagious! You can improve your own outlook simply by hanging out with an optimist. (By the way, other emotional states are also contagious, including pessimism, so it works both ways. Be careful whom you hang out with.)

Optimists are healthier. Optimists report that they feel healthier…and interestingly, they actually are healthier. They’re better at fighting off everything from the common cold to certain forms of cancer - and when optimists do become ill, they recover more quickly. According to the Harvard School of Public Health, optimists have less cardiovascular disease, better cholesterol readings, and lower levels of triglycerides. On the mental health side of things, optimists beat out pessimists on practically every mental health study conducted to date.

Optimists have better relationships. Both personally and professionally, optimists have better relationships with their parents, spouses, children, friends, co-workers - pretty much everyone. Why? Because optimists possess a certain set of characteristics that foster good relationships: studies show that they’re more cooperative, forgiving, understanding, supportive, and encouraging. And who wouldn’t enjoy a relationship with someone like that?

This is by no means the entire list of benefits. Research also shows that optimists make better athletes, better parents, they’re better at handling stress, they have better marriages, they make more money, they receive more job offers and more work promotions, they live longer, they like themselves, and they enjoy life more fully. Wow! 

So, you’re undoubtedly convinced that optimism is the way to go, but perhaps you’re not sure how to get there, especially if you naturally tend toward pessimism.

Well, optimism is an acquirable skill, assuming you’re willing to focus on becoming more positive. 

Enter: Dr. Martin E. P. Seligman, a pioneer of the positive psychology movement and a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Seligman has done extensive research on optimism, and he found that the following strategies will improve your outlook in just one week: 

Use your signature strengths in a new way. Researchers asked study participants to name their top five strengths - generosity, for instance, or creativity - and then told them to use one of these strengths in a new and different way every day for one week. The result? The volunteers measurably increased their happiness for a full six months. 

Write down the good things. Every day, participants were asked to write down three things that had gone well and why they happened. And again, even though the experiment lasted only one week, participants reported feeling happier for six months afterward. 

Pay a gratitude visit. Participants were given one week to write and then deliver a letter of gratitude in person to someone who had been especially kind to them, but whom they had never thanked properly. The happiness boost from this experiment lasted about one month. 

These suggestions from Dr. Seligman will work, no doubt. And so will this: declare yourself an optimist and then behave like one. This is one of my favorite secrets of life! We sometimes must behave as if something is true before it becomes true. But don't worry - here's what happens next: reality will soon match up with whatever you're focusing your thoughts on. You will become an optimist because you will technically already be one. 

One more word on optimism, and this one's personal. I used to think that being an optimist was soft, or minimally, not a well-thought-out position to take as an intelligent business professional. I used to qualify my optimism by calling myself a “realistic optimist.” (I still like that description, and it does indeed fit me, but in this case, I was trying to sound tougher - not a good reason to invent a self-descriptive phrase.) But these days, I make no qualifications or apologies. I'm an optimist! Plain and simple. I love to spread the word: I believe in the goodness of others, I believe in the positive outcome, I believe in the happy ending, and I also believe that my belief in these things is why I feel as if my life has been blessed in virtually every arena - my optimism has allowed for it. I encourage you to give it a try!

That’s it for today. No matter which holiday tradition you celebrate, I wish you the very best, and may 2023 bring all good things your way. Happy Holidays!