Theme of Discussion Zoom Meeting: Optimism

Email: rgordon118@tampabay.rr.com

For several questions, I have provided links that will take you to related online information. Try coming up with your own thoughts first – then investigate the links or ignore them – whatever you wish. If the links don’t work with just clicking your mouse arrow, hold down your Ctrl key as you click. Any problems with a link please let me know: rgordon118@tampabay.rr.com

Questions: Lots of questions here. No doubt too many for an hour’s discussion as so often is the case in the guides. So just select the ones you would like to focus on. REG

1. What does optimism mean to you?

2. How can parents nourish optimism in their children?

3. If a pessimist married an optimist, is their marriage sure to fail? Or is that just a pessimistic view? Would an optimist say their marriage is more likely to succeed if two pessimists married? Would a couple of optimists be headed for special problems?

4. What makes a person optimistic? Do genes play a role? Early childhood experiences? Education? Financial status?

5. What quick sketch can you create to illustrate optimism? Pessimism? Note if your sketches spotlight a male or female. Why might that observation be significant?

6. Do women tend to be more optimistic than men? Children more optimistic than adults? Blacks more optimistic than whites? Handsome, beautiful people more optimistic than those with an unattractive appearance? Does answering these questions draw you to any important conclusions?

7. Did the Covid pandemic and political strife make Americans in general less optimistic than they had been in years before these especially stressful times? Toward the future?

8. How does growing older – into our later years – affect our feelings of optimism or pessimism?

9. What color reminds you of pessimism? Of optimism? Any significance if you were creating advertisements?

10. Regarding our Nation’s future, do young Democrats tend to be more optimistic than young Republicans? Or vice-versa? How about Republicans and Democrats in general – not just the younger ones/

11. As we grow older, are we more likely to be pessimistic than optimistic?

12. What single question might you ask someone to determine if she/he is a pessimist or an optimist?

13. If someone identifies her favorite color as pink, would she be more likely to be an optimist than if she named red as her favorite? How about grey? (Influence of color in general on provoking feelings of pessimism or optimism?)

14. Is someone driving a white car more likely to be an optimist than if he drove a black car?

15. How can the interior design of a home suggest whether the owner is a pessimist or an optimist?

16. How can a political leader inspire optimism? Can you identify such a leader today?

17. If you were to listen to hours of daily news, how might that experience influence your feelings of optimism or pessimism?

18. Have you ever read a book or a single poem – or perhaps heard a music selection – that inspired optimism?

19. In our discussion today. What – if any – new insight did you gain about pessimism and/or optimism? Am I – the creator of this guide – being optimistic in assuming that you learned anything of value about these two terms? If I, as the leader of our discussion, went into out meeting today feeling pessimistic, would that influence the outcome?

Quotations:

“Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.” – Helen Keller
“Pessimism leads to weakness, optimism to power.” – William James
“Urgent optimism is the desire to act immediately to tackle an obstacle, combined with the belief that we have a reasonable hope of success.” Jane McGonigal
“If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn’t. Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism.” -- Oscar Wilde
“Optimism is the opium of the people.” -- Milan Kundera
“Optimism is the madness of insisting that all is well when we are miserable.”-- Voltaire
“Optimism can be more powerful than a battery of artillery or squadron of tanks. It can be contagious and it’s necessary to being a leader.”-- Gen. Rick Hillie
“Choose to be optimistic, it feels better.”― Dalai Lama XIV

9. “To be optimistic is to assume things will work out. To be hopeful is to realize things can work out if you work at them. Hope requires responsibility and agency; optimism relieves us of both. In rooting for your sports team, choose optimism. In rooting for democracy, choose hope.” — Eric Liu

10. “Optimism isn’t a belief that things will automatically get better; it’s a conviction that we can make things better.” — Melinda Gates

11. “Optimism is a strategy for making a better future. Because unless you believe that the future can be better, it's unlikely you will step up and take responsibility for making it so. If you assume that there's no hope, you guarantee that there will be no hope.”— Noam Chomsky

12. “Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble.”— John Lewis

13. “The world belongs to optimists. Pessimists are only spectators” --. Francois Guizot

14. “I’d rather be an optimist and a fool than a pessimist and right.” -- Albert Einstein

15. “Optimism isn’t believing nothing bad will happen. It’s about believing in your ability to handle it when it does.: -- Mel Robbins

16. “Pessimists sound smart. Optimists make money.” -- Nat Friedman

17. “A pessimist rolls down hills. An optimist climbs mountains.” – REG

The End