A Gift
My dear business partner gave me this self-help psychology book
for my last birthday. That tells you two things straight off. First
of all, she thinks I could do with being a lot less pessimistic! I,
of course, argue that I'm simply a realist; later on I'll reveal
the author's take on this issue.
Secondly, Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your
Life is no pop psychology book based on "a gallon of clinical
lore and a teaspoonful of research" to quote the author. It
reflects 25 years of quantitative trials that began with Seligman's
development of the theory of learned helplessness and progressed by
degrees to insights about optimism.
Galia discovered Seligman - known as the father of Positive
Psychology - when she was researching a career move and came across
the Centre for Positive Organisational Scholarship. She found the
online exercises and advice very helpful and when she saw this 1990
book listed under his name she grabbed it for me, though she'd not
read it herself.
High price of pessimism
Pessimism is revealed as a dangerous beast. It can lead to less
success, lower health and more depression. The author notes that
the skills of being happy are not the same as the skills of not
being anxious or sad. In other words, curing negatives such as
phobias and mental illness does not produce the positive of being
happy.
There's currently an "epidemic of depression among adults and
children in the US". There simply aren't enough good therapists to
go round and the prospect of medicating half a generation is
terrifying. Luckily, Seligman's research has demonstrated that
optimism - which significantly reduces depression - can be
learned.
No mindless mantras
Fear not. This book does not advocate mindless repetition of
feel good statements like 'every day in every way I'm getting
better and better'. The author says if that method works for you,
fabulous, but believes that most educated people, trained in
sceptical analysis, will find that approach lacking in
credibility.
Explanatory styles
Instead, he advocates changing thought patterns and explanatory
styles - the scripts you instinctively say to yourself when
something happens. These are words you may not even be aware of,
but they affect how you feel and respond in the longer term.
There are three dimensions to explanatory style:
- Permanence - how long you perceive the effect of the event will
last
- Pervasiveness - how many areas of your life you allow the event
to colour
- Personal - the extent to which you see your actions as directly
influencing the event.
Take a bad event, such as getting laid off. A pessimist will see
it as more permanent, more pervasive and more due to his own
inadequate actions. An optimist will see it as temporary, confined
to the arena of work, or that specific job, and not due to his
actions.
Take a good event like getting a promotion. The pessimist sees
it as temporary, limited to a specific time/place/situation and not
due to his own efforts. An optimist - you can guess it already -
will see it as permanent, spilling into other areas of life and
largely due to his actions.
Example of instinctive scripts: When a company offers to rehire
people it has had to lay off previously, the optimist thinks, "I
knew they'd appreciate my worth in the end." The pessimist thinks,
"They must be desperate to want me again."
Diagnostic
In Chapter Three, a 48 question diagnostic tests your responses
to good and bad events on the permanent, pervasive and personal
dimensions. As in any scenario-based quiz, some set-ups are hard to
imagine realistic responses to, and the odd one I simply couldn't
understand. However, when I revisited the dubious questions later,
the results appeared robust to different answers.
I found I had a consistent explanatory style, regardless of the
type of event. I seem to see everything as temporary, specific and
not due to my efforts. This works a treat with bad events and,
indeed, as the author predicts, I bounce back and persevere.
Because I don't feel helpless, I don't get depressed.
Unfortunately, I get absolutely no mental leverage out of good
things that happen. If I can possibly discount them, I will. Taken
together, the scores say I am very pessimistic! It would seem Galia
was right on that …
Learning to be more optimistic
At this point I discovered a weakness in the book. With its
roots in learned helplessness, the logic presented is that people
with very pessimistic scores must be poor at dealing with bad
events. All the examples presented to coach more optimism and all
the upside promised are based on weak responses to bad events.
Exploration of weak response to good events is missing.
That said, becoming aware of my explanatory style has already
been useful in adjusting my perception of events. Also, it's easy
enough to turn around the exercises for practising more optimism to
work in my own situation.
The main techniques for boosting optimism are based around:
- distraction - becoming aware of your scripts enough to be able
to stop yourself thinking something pervasive and destructive like
"I'm stupid at everything I do"
- disputation - arguing with yourself as an outsider would, for
example, "I got high scores in all my other tests so I
can't be stupid at everything I do." Seligman acknowledges
that there will be times when disputation is hard and seems
far-fetched. But he says that many negative thoughts are equally,
if not more, outrageous. I think he's right!
Pessimists are realists
Seligman scores lots of points with me on this one. He and his
research colleagues had pondered the evolutionary point of
pessimism. If it produced lower health, more depression and reduced
success in life, what on earth was it good for? Their conclusion
was that pessimism was valuable in the climatic catastrophes of the
Pleistocene for injecting rational assessment of risk. It's sunny
now, but the ice creeps higher every winter… the sabre-toothed
tiger could be back any time…
Consequently, they outlined jobs that would suit natural
pessimists (safety engineering, for example) and specific life
situations in which it would be a better response than unbridled
optimism - say at the outset of a conversation in which you want to
appear sympathetic to others' troubles.
However, it is clear that those jobs and situations are in the
minority. Overall, an optimistic outlook, very occasionally
tempered with an injection of realism, will serve you better.
Children
The advice on coaching to change explanatory styles, as well as
the diagnostic described above, can be used with children,
especially those over the age of 8. Interestingly:
- pre-pubertal children are highly optimistic compared with
adults
- pessimism and depression pre puberty is more prevalent in boys
and after puberty it switches around dramatically to girls. They
are still researching the drivers of this.
Broader uses and applications
The book claims that levels of optimism among presidential
candidates and in sports teams can predict their level of success.
They measure optimism by analysing speeches and reported comment
and have found high levels of optimism correlate with positive
outcomes. Pessimistic words can put off voters, it seems, just as
much as they undermine the individual's and team's confidence and
ultimately success.
Even more tellingly, a positive correlation has emerged between
optimism and health. A longitudinal study of men's health with
their youthful diary entries and more recent interviews (to measure
their levels of optimism through life) has shown that the optimists
live longer and in a fitter state. This research of course risks -
and has attracted - accusations of quackery because it flies in the
teeth of received medical wisdom.
Absorbing
I read this book from cover to cover, including the appendices,
while sitting by a pool on holiday in the tropics. That's testament
both to the readability of Seligman's style and to how clearly I
could see personal upside in applying his techniques. Try it for
yourself. And if you're sure you're one of life's optimists, then
my congratulations, and pick it up instead for your child, spouse
or friend. Chances are, they'll thank you for it.
Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life is
available at Amazon.
© Professionelle Ltd 2007