Opting for Optimism
Joe Biden has flipped my mood as unequivocally as he flipped Michigan and Wisconsin from red to blue last week. On one level, I’m shocked that a middle class, white male, establishment politician has been able to shake up my perspective so dramatically, but then heroes come in the most unlikely of forms. Turning 78 on November 20, Joe Biden is the oldest president-elect in the history of the United States, and according to recent research, this piece of trivia could reveal as much about the Democrat’s character as it does his lifestyle choices – Biden does not smoke or drink and exercises five times a week. According to Psychology Today, five decades of research have found that optimism is a potent health tonic. “Optimistic people remain healthier and live longer. When optimistic people encounter an adverse health event...they bounce back faster.” Biden, in fact, survived two brain aneurysms in the late 1980s. It’s safe to deduce then that the Irish-American is most likely an optimist. Could “Sleepy” Joe – as Donald Trump liked to call him – awaken all of us to the impact that practising optimism can have, mentally, emotionally and physically?
Pre-pandemic, pessimism had a certain caché attached to it. Every television show I’ve ever loved has had a resident cynic, and they almost always had the best lines, from Carla in Cheers and Chandler in Friends to hecklers Statler and Waldorf in The Muppet Show. It used to be kind of cool to be gloomy, to indulge in melancholy over a bottle of Merlot, to huff and puff about how the world had gone to hell over a sneaky cigarette. The 19th-century philosopher and political economist John Stuart Mill once wrote, “I have observed that not the man who hopes when others despair, but the man who despairs when others hope, is admired by a large class of people as a sage.” Pessimism is viewed as offering a more intellectual perspective, the inside track even.
Having said that, nobody likes a gloomy Cassandra. On the other hand, blithe optimism – the Tigger type; or should I say the Boris Johnson type – can be frustrating when it’s encountered anywhere outside of a Winnie The Pooh book. How annoying is it when you’re feeling down in the dumps and someone flippantly fires the phrase “positive mental attitude!” at you. Blind optimism can also be dangerous, prompting people to ignore potential threats and act irresponsibly. Take Donald Trump’s attitude to the coronavirus – “It’s going to disappear one day, it’s like a miracle, it will disappear”. His attempt at optimism was interpreted by most for what it was, straightforward stupidity, which has led to a steady increase in Covid-19 deaths in the US. Being on the extreme side of any emotion or pattern of behaviour can lead to heartache for ourselves and others, of course.
But even Donald Trump could learn to practice optimism in the correct manner, if he wanted to because according to Dr Alan Rozanski, a cardiologist at Mount Sinai St Luke’s Hospital in New York, in an interview with The New York Times, “It’s never too early and it’s never too late to foster optimism. From teenagers to people in their 90s, all have better outcomes if they’re optimistic.” Good news if you’ve never considered yourself a glass-half-full type. Like resilience, which I wrote about recently for Heyday, optimism is not an emotion or attitude we’re born with or one which must be nurtured and encouraged from a young age to take hold, it’s a behaviour that we can learn and begin to practice at any age. Although I consider myself a reasonably optimistic individual, I do suffer from anxiety, and sometimes simply looking on the bright side, finding the silver lining, faking it till I feel it isn’t enough to conquer those irrational fears that bubble up spontaneously within me. As much as I think optimism is essential to our health and wellbeing, and vital to getting through this pandemic in one emotional piece, I think there’s something else that I, and others like me, could add to our emotional arsenal – ever heard of defensive pessimism?
The phrase doesn’t sound very bright and shiny does it? The harsh consonants, thumping rhythm and negative tone of both individual words add up to a personality trait that Mr Heckles from Friends might have been very happy to lay claim to. But it can yield extremely positive dividends, especially for individuals whose personality type does not respond to the traditional and oversimplified mantra of “Always look on the bright side of life”. Julie K Norem, a professor of psychology at Wellesley College in Massachusetts, told Oprah.com that, “Defensive pessimism is a strategy used in specific situations to manage anxiety, fear and worry. Defensive pessimists prepare for a situation by setting low expectations for themselves, then follow up with a detailed assessment of everything that may go wrong [before] figuring out how to handle [it]...That gives them a sense of control.” It’s the fail to plan, plan to fail approach essentially, which I’ve always liked. I’ve also always liked feeling in control.
While studies show that optimism improves health and wellbeing, research now indicates that defensive pessimism can also offer concrete health benefits. A study published in the Asian Journal of Social Psychology reported that while defensive pessimists will worry more about becoming ill during the outbreak of an infectious disease, they are more likely to take preventive action, like washing their hands, for instance. This makes for interesting reading given the year that’s in it. While a straightforward pessimist will simply have a negative view of what lies ahead of them, including how a pandemic might impact on their lives, a defensive pessimist will use his or her negative expectations as motivation to take control and affect real change for the better.
I think there’s a bit of defensive pessimism in most of us. We’re Irish after all, a nation once described by Lonely Planet as “fatalistic and pessimistic to the core”.
Given Joe Biden’s rich Irish ancestry, I suspect he balances that “sunny side up” American positivity with a bit of good old-fashioned Irish cynicism. It seems to me that defensive pessimism – not expecting too much, but preparing for every eventuality in the hope of a more positive outcome – probably got the seasoned-politician-but-less-than-impactful-public-speaker through those live debates opposite the always over-confident Donald Trump. Interestingly, defensive pessimists tend to be very successful individuals, according to the Oprah.com article cited earlier, with unrealistically low opinions of every outcome. This sounds like almost every woman I know, to be honest. I think strategically balancing optimism with defensive pessimism is a pretty good formula for strong mental health; I’ll adopt the former for bigger picture moments and the latter for personal circumstances I need to navigate on my own.
Meanwhile, I’ll bear in mind what the anxiety-ridden comic strip character Charlie Brown said in response to his friend Linus Van Felt’s remark that “Life is difficult, isn’t it, Charlie Brown?” Charlie replied, “Yes, it is, but I’ve developed a new philosophy. I only dread one day at a time.”
Marie Kelly, November 2020.
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