Optimist? Pessimist? Realist? How about being all three?
It’s impossible to be strictly an optimist, a pessimist or a realist. So, why are we still living life confined by these categories?
“Are you an optimist, pessimist or a realist?” Seriously? It’s 2023. It’s possible to identify as non-binary, be proudly multilingual, be in the middle of two careers and four income streams. Why must we put ourselves into only one of three non-spill Tupperware boxes?
Think about it. It’s possible to be optimist, pessimist and a realist all at once, depending on the situation and what’s needed at the time. It’s what we’re all doing, anyway.
Leave the absolutes to the movies. Imtiaz Ali’s Jab We Met (2017) has the full set: Aditya (Shahid Kapoor) is a pessimist, Geet (Kareena Kapoor Khan) is an eternal optimist, Anshuman (Tarun Arora), comes across as the most level-headed. He’s practical about his decision to not indulge in Geet’s plans to elope, though he’s hardly a man to snatch up.
A 2004 study by the German University of Greifswald and Freie Universität Berlin suggests that realists indulge in the most adaptive behaviour when it comes to goals and actions. It also says that optimists tend to adjust their feelings and to the situation, but not their goals and actions. So they chase persistently unattainable goals.
There’s merit, really, in being all three. Deciding which mindset is needed, and when, calls for assessing one’s control over their situation, says Divija Bhasin psychologist, psychotherapist, and founder of Delhi-based mental health organisation The Friendly Couch. An employee can’t do anything about an impending layoff, she points out. But they can control when and where to apply for a new one. “Decisions in which a person has more control over the consequences call for more optimism,” she says. In other words, don’t hold out naively until HR sets up a Zoom call. But don’t feel so defeated that you underperform while the job’s still secure.
The most recent biennial National Institute on Retirement Security study in the US finds that millennials are significantly more pessimistic (72 %) about being financially secure at retirement than boomers (43 %). This may be because a retirement plan constitutes catastrophic thinking. A good way out is to ask “What can I control about this?” and act on that, suggests Bhasin. “Otherwise, it will lead to more anxiety.”
Being flexible works with managing the present too. Those who’ve been burned once too often tend to be wary, giving up hope. Joel (Jim Carrey) even tried to physically wipe his ex (Kate Winslet) from his memories in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004). “Don’t go on a first date expecting to get into a relationship,” advises Bhasin. “Instead, socialise in places where you’re more likely to meet new people.” Delhi-based Dr Neerja Aggarwal, a psychologist who is also the CEO of Emoneeds, a digital platform for mental health services, believes that pessimism, at least a bit of it, helps with financial planning. It’s what prompts budgeting, saving for emergencies and restricts impulse buying.
Besides, moods change through the seasons, sometimes even from hour to hour. Why not adjust one’s view of the world accordingly? Stanford University professor of psychology and communication Nilam Ram studies how hour-to-hour, day-to-day responses fluctuate depending on conditions at work and at home, and who one is with. His work shows that high or low emotional variability is not a personality trait in itself. We’re more than a single Tupperware.
