"Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all."

Dale Carnegie

Our inner thoughts directly affect our outer life, which is why it’s essential to make sure that you are directing your thoughts in as positive a way as possible.  Building optimism helps you develop a buffer zone against stress, setbacks and disappointments. It gives you staying power and resilience when your future is fogged with uncertainty. It helps you protect your health and overall quality of life. Optimism has long been considered to be a major asset across such diverse fields as business, politics, academics, leadership, athletics and health – but we’ve never put our finger on the reasons why, making the notion of a “soft” one. Now science is backing the charge towards a more optimistic workplace, and world.

Eye opening information has surfaced on the impact of optimism. Some results include determining that: Positive emotions and optimistic thinking lead to higher pay and better evaluations from supervisors. Pessimistic salespeople sell less and have higher turnover than optimists – and that the most effective executives use positive words four times more often than negative words.  With those kinds of results, it is well worth your time and energy to examine and possibly alter your thought patterns towards a more positive path.

True optimism is not to be confused with positive thinking.  What makes optimism particularly effective is not merely repeating positive statements to ourselves. While the message that Norman Vincent Peale, the father of the “Power of Positive Thinking” conveyed was instrumental in changing many peoples’ lives, positive thinking is just the first step in becoming truly optimistic.  That is to say, you have to BELIEVE what you are telling yourself.  If you are repeating positive thoughts to yourself, but don’t actually believe them, take a step back and choose different positive phrases. Make it sincere and believable, not just a wish. 

We’re Optimistic About Our Optimism Levels, But…

About three out of four people in the United States consider themselves optimists. However, research shows that as with most traits, optimism and pessimism are evenly distributed across the population. In order to reach true optimism you need to take a closer look at some important questions. Many people are identifying their optimism levels incorrectly, so your first task is to take a hard look at that half-full glass.

Some Optimistic Approaches

Here are three “key” ways to approach situations optimistically. 

• First, be kind to yourself; know that a negative situation is typically the result of a confluence of many events.  It is not likely to have been entirely created by you. 

• Second, always expect good things to happen.  That may seem like obvious advice, but many of us are so trained to give play to fearful feelings, especially at a critical point when we should be strengthening positive outcome possibilities. 

• Third, accept the temporal nature of your problem; the results are not likely to cause the kind of consequences that you think, and they are less far-reaching than you first expect. 

Optimism is an often-untapped resource for performance improvement.  Let it pervade all of your thought patterns in order to take advantage of the life-changing possibilities it offers.   True optimism will brighten your spirit, strengthening your performance and position you to give far more back to the world.