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If you practice optimism and you do it right, optimism works and you’ll have a fantastic life. But to practice optimism properly, you need openness and consistency.
Let’s say you want to network so you have more clients for your business. It doesn’t matter what kind of business – every business needs clients. You make a list of all the events that you could attend so you can meet potential clients.
When your list is ready, you notice 10 events where 100 to 500 attendees will be present. You plan to go to each of them and meet as many people as possible, and tell them about your business. Eventually, you hope you’find a few clients because that is what you want – to grow your business.
The first event is in two weeks.
You get ready and make sure you feel prepared to meet new people. But one day before the event, you realize the event was canceled. There’s nothing you can do, so you focus on the next event, which is in 10 days.
Therefore, you start preparing for the next event, even though you are ready because of all the things you did for the first event. Then, two days before the event, you are in a car accident and can’t walk. You have to stay in bed to recover.
Not only you couldn’t get to the second event, but you’re also going to miss the next 3-4 events, since you’ll need at least one month of recovery.
The more you experience such events, the more you’ll use these events as excuses to avoid similar experiences in the future.
After the recovery period is gone and you can walk again, you look at your list of remaining events and ask yourself:
- Should I do this?
- Should I go to all these events?
- Should I keep trying to grow my business?
Because of these negative thoughts, you transfer the energy from your past into your future, and end up living the same past on repeat.
If you let these thoughts intervene and take control, you’ll eventually become a pessimist. You’ll start believing things never work to your advantage and won’t even give opportunities a chance to manifest. You’ll be convinced you won’t be able to do the things you want to do because of your accident, because the event was canceled, because you don’t like the speakers, because the venue is too far, and so on.
This way of thinking is connected to your failures and past negative experiences. This way of thinking is not an optimistic one.
When you practice it right, optimism works
To practice optimism so you can have a better life means being present.
If you’re not present, then you’re absorbed by your past or your future. Your mind will continue to think about what you could have done or about what you should do.
But no matter how much you try to be optimistic about your past, the past won’t change. And no matter how much you try to be optimistic about your future, if you’re stuck in your past, the future will never manifest.
If you can’t let go of your traumatic past, you can’t have an optimistic future. You simply can’t.
I used to struggle to lose weight. Around one and a half years ago, I weighed 85 kilograms and I was frustrated. Currently, I have 70-72 kilograms and I maintain this weight.
I did all the things I needed to do to lose weight (less junk food, more healthy food, running, dancing, etc), but only 2-3 weeks of consistently doing these things, something would trigger a certain behavior, and that behavior used to led me to unhealthy food and self-sabotaging.
I don’t have such experiences anymore. I’m present, live in the present moment, and am optimistic about my future. Optimism works!
Optimism, consistency, and openness
Beyond leaving the past in the past, there are 3 things that can help you live a great life:
- Optimism – to have thoughts about yourself and your future that help you build the life you want
- Consistency – to build the life you want to have, knowing that you can’t build anything great just by doing something once
- Openness – to be open to experiencing the things that manifest in your life, even if you didn’t plan them
Have in mind these 3 things and you’ll life will improve.
With love and optimism,
David
