“The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.”-George F. Will, The Leveling Wind. This quote struck me as an answer to all those times my near and dear ones had told me that I needed to say good bye to the pessimist in me and adopt a happier way of life that would make me an optimist like everybody else. Like everything else I acquired via peer pressure, optimism was supposed to be one of them. However to the disappointment of many, I am proud to announce that I did brilliantly to ward off the bad habit called optimism.
In my opinion, the optimistic grinning puppets are the selfish people who care not about tomorrow or yesterday as today is a ‘gift’ and tic tac toe along life blowing up all the cash they have. I could also not help but notice that they are the ones who end up with matured-sooner-than-age kids who are struggling through life either lost in addiction (of delusions of grandeur?) or living a life that would have been better had the parents been a little less delusional. The question here is not if the glass is half empty or half full but that the glass can be kept full if you are not a harum-scarum.
Optimists are everywhere, happy, perky, content especially in the capitalist market selling hope – in the media, politics, beauty parlours, fashion boutiques -selling rays of hope for a better afternoon, tomorrow, that perfect dress, the flawless skin. What it has done is refrained us from demanding a constitution from 601 people who we have paid and are still paying to do the job. In our comfortably numb psyche we have accepted that eventually things will get better, and until that happens we are just too happy to bother. After all in the end all will be well and if not it’s not the end, eh?
What’s shocking is that the trend after 10 years of war and devastation, we are eager now to find happy success stories–they call it silver lining in the cloud. Which begs the question how is it helping us as a nation? Do we not need healthy dose pessimism to scrutinize our moves if we are casting a vote.
Most optimists in Nepal are in the development sector, drawing above average salaries for selling hope to the downtrodden and sad. At the districts it’s the same opportunities lest at a smaller scale. Also I see optimism among been-there-done-that capitalist’s children. Hell yes I would be optimistic if I knew everything is taken care of and have the luxury of tripping on the delusions of grandeur after I am a couple of joints happy.
On the other hand, what we do want cautious people to take care of our funds. Who wants a happy-go-lucky investment banker for instance? While we do want people at our banks to be cautious and prepared for the worst as far as caring for our life’s savings are concerned and by the nature of their jobs/to protect our investments to be pessimistic.
If we want optimism to sell as hot cakes to have a world full of doe-eyed happy creatures, why not get a pep talk from a counsellor who tells us everything is in our heads instead of going to a hard core cardio doc who warns us to change our eating habits to avoid a heart attack. This begs the question, is pessimism really really that bad for mankind?
Success I am told comes to those who believe in them. Yes it does but does the one who falls down not be better off to have a plan B or a plan C, if plan A fails. So why are we so reluctant to welcome the thought that the making of that plan B or C comes from thoughts that plan A possibly would fail and that would be elements of pessimism. Logic tells me that success comes because you are lucky and not because you are naively positive but cleverly negative i.e. not paralysed by pessimism.
Pessimism presents an opportunity to review the ballyhoo, check out the alternatives and map out alternate courses of action. So by giving it a bad name altogether, has it not been robbed of its virtues altogether?
As for me, Yes I am a pessimist and I am a happier person because I imagine the worst and despite that once in a while life does find a way to knock the wind out of me.
Makuree writes for catharsis, because she loves learning new things and finds almost everything very interesting for a while . She somehow wants whatever she does to be mindful of the bigger picture. However this isn’t to say she doesn’t fly, spend too much money, occasionally drink too much and behave really badly .
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