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Growing up I never questioned whether I was a pessimist or an optimist. I was raised to be a pessimist. My dad would say “Judi, just think the worst will happen and then you’ll be happily surprised when it doesn’t”. I was simply raised to think that way, and just in the past recent years (when I finally decided to grow up…just a little) I realized that maybe, just maybe, my dear wonderful pop…was wrong.

A couple weeks ago I was visiting my parents in Los Angeles and I brought this up to him. I said “Dad, do you suppose it is better to think of positive outcomes instead? What’s wrong with that?” His answer “Well, than you’re just setting yourself up for disappointment”. There’s no arguing with my dad, so I dropped the subject. (Quite Pessimistic of me, wouldn’t you say?)

But, is it so wrong to be disappointed once in awhile? Can’t disappointment also come bring about learning and character building? I think I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s better to be disappointed than to always be thinking that “doom” is just around the corner. There have been studies that show how much our brains can manifest unhealthy responses from our bodies. So if someone is always thinking negatively, can’t that then, affect their health?

So I vote for raising more Optimistic children, especially after watching the Michael J. Fox special that was on television a few weeks ago. Talk about an optimistic guy and so inspiring!

Here are five steps to raising an Optimistic Child thanks to http://www.teach-nology.com/tutorials/teaching/optim/:

Step 1: Learn to think optimistically yourself. What children see and hear indirectly from you as you lead your life and interact with others influences them much more than what you try to ‘teach’ them.

You can model optimism for your child by incorporating optimistic mental skills into your own way of thinking. This is not easy and does not occur over night. But with practice, almost everyone can learn to think differently about life’s events – even parents!

Step 2: Teach your child that there is a connection between how they think and how they feel. You can do this most easily by saying aloud how your own thoughts about adversity create negative feelings in you.

For example, if you are driving your child to school and a driver cuts you off, verbalize the link between your thoughts and feelings by saying something like “I wonder why I’m feeling so angry; I guess I was saying to myself: ‘Now I’m going to be late because the guy in front of me is going so darn slow. If he is going to drive like that he shouldn’t drive during rush hour. How rude.’”

Step 3: Create a game called ‘thought catching.’ This helps your child learn to identify the thoughts that flit across his or her mind at the times they feel worst. These thoughts, although barely noticeable, greatly affect mood and behavior.

For instance, if your child received a poor grade, ask: “When you got your grade, what did you say to yourself?”

Step 4: Teach your child how to evaluate automatic thoughts. This means acknowledging that they things you say to yourself are not necessarily accurate.

For instance, after receiving the poor grade your child may be telling himself he is a failure, he is not as smart as other kids; he will never be able to succeed in school, etc. Many of these self-statements may not be accurate, but they are ‘automatic’ in that situation.

Step 5: Instruct your child on how to generate more accurate explanations (to themselves) when bad things happen and use them to challenge your child’s automatic but inaccurate thoughts. Part of this process involves looking for evidence to the contrary (good grades in the past, success in other life areas, etc).

Another skill to teach your child to help him or her think optimistically is to ‘decatastrophize’ the situation – that is – help your child see that the bad event may not be as bad or will not have the adverse consequences imagined. Few things in life are as devastating as we fear, yet we blow them up in our minds.

Parents can influence the thinking styles of their children by modeling the principals of optimistic thinking.

And I leave you with a quote from Rene Descartes:

An optimist may see a light where there is none, but why must the pessimist always run to blow it out?

judi diamond