A Case Presentation: Pessimism Can Be Positive
During the last few years, many studies have found that optimists live longer and are healthier and happier than pessimists.
Popular articles that have been published in weekly magazines and newspapers delivered those findings to the readers. The message is clear: Optimism is good; Pessimism
is bad.
While treating many couples and observing many of my married friends, I have concluded, that one member tends to be more
optimistic while his/her spouse tends to be more pessimistic. I found out that some of their children were optimists and the others were pessimists. Since all personality traits
shared by most people, regardless of their gender, race and culture, are the outcome of nature and nurture, I hypothesized that both traits contributed to the survival of our
ancestors. As with any other trait, when optimism and pessimism are too extreme, they may have negatively affected the survival of our ancestors as well as the adjustment
of modern humans.
A Case Presentation:
Lea and Harry applied for couple therapy, since they used to argue very often. During one of our sessions, Harry brought up
an issue that has been bothering him for a long time. He claimed that Lea is very pessimistic. I asked Lea if she saw herself as being a pessimistic person.
"Yes I am," she answered quickly, "and I don't like it at all. I am always worried about potential problems. For example, I become very stressed when my children take a school trip or when Harry is very late coming home from work. I read that it is not healthy to be a pessimist. Can you help
me to become an optimist?"
"I can understand Harry's wish that you becomes an optimistic person, and I also understand that being a pessimist or an overly worried person may be very stressful," I said in a supportive voice. "At the same time, since I have found many advantages to being a pessimist, I don't have any
intention in making you an optimist, especially since I believe it is very hard or even impossible."
"Dr. Elitzur, I pay you money to improve my marriage and not to destroy it. Since we got married, I am trying very hard to change Lea's outlook on life. She wishes to change as well. Now you ruin every thing." Harry sounded very angry.
"I understand your feelings, Harry. Let me explain why it is very hard, or even impossible to change a pessimistic person to be an optimistic one. If you observe children, you may notice that some are more optimistic and others are more pessimistic from an early age. The optimists tend to be
braver, and the pessimists more fearful. These two traits are partially genetic and as such, they have enhanced the survival of our ancestors."
"I am confused," Harry said. "If Lea's ancestor was a pessimist, he probably was a lousy hunter, since whenever he went hunting, he anticipated being devoured by predators. As much as I know, women in the ancient time did not like to be impregnated by such hunters. As a result; the
chances for Lea being born were very slim." Harry looked very proud of himself for coming up with such an argument.
"You forgot, Harry, that Lea's pessimistic relative had a good optimistic friend; I mean your ancestor. I assume that they used to go hunting together. I could imagine their conversation before going hunting. Your relative said to Lea's relative, "I am sure today we are going to catch the big deer that we saw last week." Lea's relative would answer, "I am terrified of the tiger that was trying to catch that deer. I have the feeling that today he is going to get us for dinner."
"Thank you for reminding me about the tiger. I saw a big tree nearby. I suggest we climb up it when the tiger approaches us."
"When you imagine their conversation, you realize how much they contributed to one another. The optimist's contribution was to encourage people to take risks, whereas the pessimist's contribution was to make sure they were aware of all the dangerous situations they might have encountered."
Lea looked very happy. "When we go someplace together, I always tell Harry to be careful when he parks the car since he tends to park too close to the next one. It happened a few times that when he drove by himself, he came home with a dent in the car door. It happened many times that he
goes to sleep after me and forgets to lock our front door."
"Yes, I admit that I am guilty of being not carful enough. I caused minor damages to our two cars, but Lea is too careful. She drives me nuts when she is always anticipating disasters."
"Harry, you are too optimistic, and Lea, you are too pessimistic. Every genetic trait when it is too extreme, instead of being positive turns out to be somewhat negative. By the way, one of the reasons you fell in love and got married was, to complement each other. You, Lea, looked for a person who may encourage you to take more risks in your life; and you, Harry, looked for a woman who may put brakes to your daring personality. My job, as your therapist, is to help each of you to appreciate his/her own contribution to the marriage, but at the same tome to learn to be less extreme."
Harry looked at Lea and said, "Do you think we should guide our two children to accept their personalities and to learn to be less extreme?"
Lea reached Harry's hand with a smile and said, "OK, let us do it."
Conclusions:
In modern time, the optimist / pessimist personality trait may be divided into four categories:
The extreme positive/optimist people are very successful in many aspects of their life. According to their
personality, they take calculated risks in their business, enjoy adventurous trips such as to remote places in the world, enjoy risky sports such as ski and mountains
climbing, and enjoy meeting new people. Statistically, such people live longer, and they are healthier and happier than the average person.
The extreme negative/optimist people are failures in most aspect of their life. In according to their personality, they
take uncalculated risk in their business and in gambling.
The extreme positive/pessimist people are successful in many aspects of life according to their personality. I believe
that in every successful business and factory, the president is a positive optimist and the vice president is a positive pessimist. In every successful marriage, one spouse is a
positive optimist and the other is a positive pessimist. The further apart these two people are, in their personalities, the more conflicts they will experience.
The extreme negative/pessimist people are failures in most aspect of their lives. They tend to be depressed and
afraid of new experiences. The use avoidance techniques and become phobic of a variety of activities such as socializing, flying, riding elevators, swimming, and taking
cruises.
As I told Harry and Lea, psychotherapy may help a negative optimist to be less negative and a negative pessimist to become
less negative, but a negative pessimist cannot change to become a positive optimist. Unfortunately, a traumatic life experience may change a positive optimist to become a
negative pessimist i.e. to apply avoidance techniques and to become phobic in certain situations.
