How To Be an Optimist (*and a Realist)
This week, autumn has hit it stride in Scotland – days are growing chillier and nights are growing longer. As I watch colleagues and friends get stuck into work, a very quiet, ambivalent question feels like it hangs in the air: “and for what?“
Maybe I’m projecting, but I feel like we’re – many of us, and for different reasons – struggling to find our mojo.
🗞️ For some of us, it’s the political cycle and apprehension about what changes might come – or worse, not come – from our new governments.
🏠 For others, it’s the deepening impacts of a long period of economic turbulence, which has genuinely made many of us worse off – and means we have to work harder, spend less, and worry more about…everything.
🌎 And for young people and dreamers – those people trying to change the world – well, from time to time, we just hit that wall when we think that no one is listening, and nothing is going to change.
This feels tricky, but we’ve been here before 🍁
If this is you, I’m here to share a few reflections, and hopefully cheer myself up too!
👵🏼 Speak to your elders: thoughtful people do get wiser as they grow older, and one of the coolest things about humanity is that we can (if we choose to) give comfort to others by sharing what we have learned. Older people in your life, and in your communities, can bring perspective to whatever you’re struggling with right now.
🍁 Bring warmth and inspiration closer in: there are people and things that you love, and that inspire you. Think broadly, and don’t be too judgmental about what those things are. For me, at this time of year, it’s the feeling of sun on my face, the taste of cinnamon and re-reading a favourite poem. Bring close your comfort things, and do it intentionally, and as a priority.
🏔️Take the long view: progress can be cyclical, like the seasons, and not always linear, and increasing (like our performance targets or… umm, the stock market). Ask yourself what winning looks like over your lifetime (or many lifetimes) and try to unstick yourself from the urgency of today’s tasks.
Also, if you’re not seeing a connection between today’s task and what you want to achieve in life, well… there’s always this option: 🗑️
Still needing a nudge? Some wise words from an elder: Wangari Maathai 🌿
Wangari Maathai was a Kenyan climate justice activist, founder of the Green Belt Movement, and the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize – which will coincidentally be announced later today.
She was, like many activist legends, a master of long view thinking.
In her memoir, Unbowed, she reflected:
No matter how dark the cloud, there is always a thin, silver lining, and that is what we must look for. The silver lining will come, if not to us then to next generation or the generation after that. And maybe with that generation the lining will no longer be thin.
👋🏾Thanks for joining us again this week for The Long View.
Are you feeling 🌿 or 🍁this week?
Feel free to share what brings you comfort, and where you’re finding the stuff you need to keep you going.
First published on LinkedIn on 11 October 2024:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-optimist-realist-jen-ang-ebcqe/
