- Being more optimistic starts with appreciating both the good and bad things that happen in your life and looking at negative things with a curious mindset.
- Practice meditation and keep a gratitude journal to focus on the positive things in your life more than the negative things.
- Adopt a healthy lifestyle and engage in activities that make you feel happy and at peace and you'll gradually feel more positive about life in general.
Becoming More Optimistic
Appreciate both the good and the bad in your life. Being optimistic doesn't mean you feel "happy" all the time. Instead, it means accepting that both negative and positive feelings are a natural part of life. When you appreciate all things that happen, it increases your resilience in the face of uncertainty. When you're optimistic, you look for the potential benefits or life lessons learned from even the most difficult situations. Think of negative things as temporary rather than a permanent state. When you have negative thoughts or feelings, examine them and think of alternative ways to respond. Life coach Leah Morris recommends that you "look at negative situations with a curious mindset, ask what needs to change here, why is this so negative? How can I begin taking steps in a different direction, potentially? What lesson can I gain from this at the end of the day?"
Practice mindful meditation for greater self-acceptance. Mindful meditation helps you acknowledge your emotions in the moment without judgment. A regular meditation practice of just a few minutes a day can reduce feelings of anxiety and depression and help reprogram the way that your body responds to stress. If you're new to meditation, download a guided meditation app or look up guided meditations on YouTube. There are plenty of guided meditations out there for free that will really help you get started. Life coach Leah Morris notes one way to be more mindful "is to simply name what it is that you're feeling and say, this is what I'm feeling in this moment, and just to acknowledge that without having to change it in any way."
Challenge negative self-talk. Life coach Sydney Axelrod emphasizes that you want to "strengthen the relationship... [with your] inner advocate... not [your] inner critic." When something bad happens, instead of blaming yourself or telling yourself what you "should" do, try to frame the thought more positively. If you're having difficulty with this, try writing down the negative thoughts that you have throughout the day. Then, come up with something more positive you could think or focus on instead.
Focus on positives rather than negatives. Take the time to appreciate and celebrate the good things that happen rather than dwelling on the bad. Share good things that happen to you with friends and family so they can appreciate them too. Once you train yourself to start looking for good things, you'll gradually start to see them everywhere. This doesn't mean that you ignore when bad things happen to you or around you. But even if bad things are happening, you can still focus on the good things that give you hope and show that the bad situations are only temporary setbacks and improvement is just around the corner.
Keep your optimism grounded and realistic. Being optimistic doesn't mean that you believe nothing bad can happen. Rather than ignore challenges and setbacks, you accept them as temporary and recognize that you'll get through them and better times are just around the corner. You do what you need to do to prepare for potential challenges and approach life from a realistic perspective. For example, a true optimist wouldn't go skydiving all on their own without ever having taken a lesson. They'd recognize the danger involved and get training from someone experienced to help lower the risk.
Repeat daily positive affirmations. Life coach Sydney Axelrod notes that positive affirmations are "just another avenue of strengthening a new belief or a new perspective that's really supportive for you." She recommends "hav[ing] a visual cue that can remind you of it throughout the day or like wearing a certain piece of jewelry that can remind you of it so you can bring it to the forefront of your consciousness more and more." Here are some affirmations you can try: "Anything is possible." "My circumstances do not create me. I create my circumstances." "The only thing I can control is my attitude towards life." "I always have a choice."
Write in a gratitude journal every day. It's easy to get distracted by what others have and not truly appreciate all that you have to be thankful for. Remember that while it's true that someone might have it better than you, there's also always someone who has it worse. Take the time to journal about the things you have to be grateful for. It's a wonderful way to get out of the cycle of negative comparisons. Life coach Sydney Axelrod notes that making a list of "five things you're grateful for every day is a great practice [for] shifting... to an abundance mentality of everything [you] do have." Say "thank you" silently to yourself as soon as you wake up in the morning. Repeating this mantra will help put you in a positive mindset.
Focus on 1 or 2 areas of your life at a time. Thinking about changing everything can be overwhelming. But the good thing is that if you only focus on 1 or 2 things at a time, the changes in those areas will have a ripple effect on other areas of your life. Start small and celebrate the progress you make. Life coach Michelle Shahbazyan recommends making a list of things in your life that you want to change or that are bringing you down. Then if you tackle those things "one by one, if you make a tangible implementable change, each part of your life that is bringing you down can change." Shahbazyan adds that "when any one part of a system changes, all of the other parts of the system start working differently, too. So if you're going more positively on some of the smaller things, but there's a lot of those smaller things, sometimes that bigger thing starts to look and feel better too."
Smile as often as you can. When you smile, the muscles in your face create "facial feedback" which can actually make a small difference in your overall mood. Plus, when you smile, other people tend to smile back. This just increases the overall good vibes all around you. There's also some evidence that smiling while you're doing something will help you enjoy that activity more. Think about this when you're doing something you feel neutral or even negative about. For example, you might try smiling while doing the dishes or folding laundry.
Recognize your connection to the world around you. Enjoy the sights, sounds, and smells around you as you go about your day. Take moments to notice how everything is interconnected. When you really notice how the beauty all around you is also connected to you, it becomes that much easier to see yourself and the world in a more optimistic way. If you feel like you're rushing through on auto-pilot, take a minute to stop and observe everything that's going on around you. It helps ground you in the physical world and appreciate how everything is related. Life coach Leah Morris recommends "the 5-4-3-2-1 technique, [where] you... notice 5 things in your sight, then you go into 4 things that you can hear and you go into 3 things that you can smell, 2 things that you can touch, and 1 thing that you can taste. It's a really quick and easy way to just drop into the present moment."
Imagine your life without the good things you love. This exercise helps you appreciate the good things that have happened to you and the benefits that have come as a result. Once a week, think about something wonderful that's happened in your life. Then, imagine how your life would be if that thing had never happened and what would be different. When you return your focus to the present and remind yourself that the wonderful thing actually did happen, you'll likely find yourself being so much more appreciative that your life has turned out the way it has. You can also use this as a journaling exercise, writing down all the possibilities that might happen if the one event you're focusing on didn't happen. Try to do this once a week at the same time every week. For example, you might do it for 10 minutes on Sunday night before going to bed.
Focus on the silver lining in every cloud. For this exercise, start by writing down 5 things that you enjoy or that you find fulfilling. Then, think about a time when things didn't go your way. Describe the situation briefly, then try to come up with at least 3 positive things that came out of that situation. For example, if you missed your bus this morning, you might note that you got some exercise running to catch the bus, you caught another bus 10 minutes later, and you won't even remember that this happened a few weeks from now. Making a habit of searching for these silver linings will help you look at things that happen more optimistically as well as thinking about setbacks as only temporary, not a permanent state of affairs.
Engage in activities that make you smile or laugh. Smiling and laughing are natural pick-me-ups and doing things you find fun is a great way to think more positively. Plus, if you're engaging in these activities on a regular basis, it gives you something to look forward to in the future. For example, if you enjoy painting, you might sign up for a weekly painting class at your local community center. Then, no matter what happens, you can tell yourself that you have your weekly painting session to look forward to. When positive things happen to you, don't keep them to yourself—share them with others! When you share something you feel great about, it makes others feel great too.
Adopt a healthy, active lifestyle. Exercise can boost your mood and reduce stress, so aim to be physically active for at least 30 minutes a day. You can break this down into smaller 5- to 10-minute chunks if that works better for you. The important thing is that you're getting out there and being active and taking care of your body. For example, you might go for a 10-minute walk after every meal. Life coach Leah Morris emphasizes that if you want to increase happiness, you need to "make sure that you're taking care of not only your mind but also your body, your heart, your soul."
Surround yourself with positive people. When you hang out with other optimists, being optimistic will start to feel less awkward and more natural to you. It also gives you the opportunity to pick up some new tricks for thinking positively or approaching challenges and other negative situations. Plus, when you're feeling down, positive friends and family can help support you and encourage you to look on the bright side. Life coach Leah Morris notes that a great way to "help you achieve more balance, more peace, more fulfillment [is] to have a really good support system."
Be positive in your actions towards others. Volunteering and charity work do a lot to enhance your mood and help boost your overall optimism. But you don't have to engage in organized work every day to feel better and more optimistic—simply practicing random acts of kindness can also give you a boost and make you feel better about the world. For example, you might buy the coffee for the person in line behind you or set your neighbor's garbage can out for them when you're setting out your own. Positivity and kindness also have a ripple effect in that they encourage others to be positive towards people as well, so you're actively increasing the positivity in the world.
Reinforce the cycle of optimism in your life. The great thing about optimism is that it really builds on itself. It might feel awkward or unnatural at first, but the more you engage in positive thinking and action, the easier it is to keep that momentum going. Eventually, you'll find being optimistic is second nature to you and the positive thoughts will come automatically without you really having to consciously work on it. Life coach Michelle Shahbazyan notes that "it creates a positive feedback loop where you do good, you feel good, you do more good, you feel better."
Benefits of Optimism
Improved overall healthPeople who are optimistic tend to have better health overall than people who are pessimistic. This might be related to the fact that people who are optimistic tend to value themselves and care about how they treat their bodies. Simply being optimistic can improve your cardiovascular health, particularly your heart and lung functioning. Being optimistic has a positive effect on your mental health as well as your physical health.
Longer lifespanStudies have shown that people who are more optimistic tend to live longer, on average, than people who are pessimistic. This could be due to the fact that they're in better overall health and it could also be related to the fact that optimistic people are less likely to get engage in dangerous or extremely risky behaviors. Optimistic people also tend to have a higher quality of life than pessimistic people throughout their lifespan.
Lower risk of depression While optimistic people tend to have better mental health in general, studies show they specifically have a lower risk of depression. This is true even for people who are genetically at a higher risk of depression. Also, when optimistic people do get depression, it tends to be milder and more responsive to treatment. Optimistic people are also much less likely to become suicidal or to have suicidal thoughts or ideations.
Better coping strategies for dealing with stress Hardships and stressful times happen to everyone, but studies show that optimistic people generally have better ways to deal with stress when it happens than people who are more pessimistic do. Stress also doesn't tend to affect optimistic people to the same extent that it affects more pessimistic people. Optimistic people tend to view hardships and stress as temporary, not a continual state of being. This might be one of the biggest reasons that they develop better ways to cope with stress.
Healthier lifestyle People who are optimistic tend to make better, and healthier, life choices than people who are pessimistic. Overall, they are less likely to engage in substance abuse or risky sexual behaviors. They also tend to exercise, eat healthier foods, and get better quality sleep. Some of these lifestyle choices might be related to the coping strategies optimistic people use to deal with stress. Some unhealthy lifestyle choices, such as substance abuse, are triggered by stress.
Lower pain sensitivity Clinical research has shown that optimistic people tend to be less sensitive toward pain and find it easier to adapt to chronic pain conditions. There's also some evidence that when optimistic people have chronic pain conditions, those conditions respond better to treatment than pessimistic people with the same conditions. A lot of this is due to the fact that optimistic people tend to expect good things to happen in the future. Because they believe that things will eventually be better, they aren't as focused on how bad things are in the moment.
Stronger immune system In addition to improving your overall health, an optimistic attitude can make you more resistant to various diseases and conditions. When an optimistic person does get sick, they typically won't be sick as long as a pessimistic person would be. They're also more likely to have relatively mild symptoms compared to a pessimistic person. Part of this might also be related to an optimistic person's lower pain sensitivity. They perceive their symptoms as mild because they aren't as sensitive to them or don't focus on them to the same extent a pessimistic person would.
Shorter recovery time after injury When optimistic people are injured or have surgery, they tend to bounce back more quickly than pessimistic people do. And when they do bounce back, they're more likely to make a full and complete recovery. Because an optimistic person thinks positively and expects good things to happen in the future, they can envision themselves returning to health and full activity. This visualization can help them recover more quickly. Another aspect of this is that optimistic people tend to be in better health overall, which also helps them have a shorter recovery time.
Reduced risk of death from serious conditions Even optimistic people can't always stay away from some of the most serious conditions, such as cancer, respiratory conditions, or infections. But when they do contract these serious conditions, they're far less likely to die as a result than their pessimistic counterparts. Again, in this case, the optimistic person is able to visualize themselves being well again. Because they view the condition as a temporary state, they're more likely to recover.
More friends People just like being around positive people. As a result, someone who's optimistic is likely to have more friends than someone who's generally pessimistic. They also typically have stronger emotional bonds with their friends and family than more pessimistic people do. Even when optimistic people are in situations where they may not have a lot of friends or get the emotional support they need, they tend to be more satisfied with their social life and social networks than people who are more pessimistic.
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