How to be optimistic.

Optimism is about perspective and attitude as much as anything else, it's about seeing all the positive things in what is seemingly negative, it is about having an attitude of gratitude and appreciation for all of the wonderful things you have already, not dwelling on things that you are without Its about seeing all the beauty that exists in the world around us.

Optimism is knowing that life is good already and believing that it is going to get better still. Optimism is a way of life and a state of mind and it can be mastered by anyone as long as they have the desire to learn it. Optimism is contagious and you can spread it around to all your friends and family. The more optimistic you become the richer your life will be and you will start to find yourself around more optimistic people. So always make sure that your glass is half full, so that you can always toast the good life.

Lets say that one of your friends hobbies is bird watching, but they kept complaining that they never see any birds so you decide to go with them to help them find some birds. When you get there you think you see a bird in the distance but your not sure so you ask your friend if you can borrow their binoculars, but they tell you that they don't have any and that you should not talk because it frightens the birds away, you wonder why but you don't say anything more about it because you don't want to scare the birds. After sitting with your friend quietly for a while you start looking around and you start seeing lots of birds, but you notice that your friend can't see any of them because he is looking in the wrong place. You tell him to look but he tells you to be quite again other wise you will scare off the birds. At the end of the day your friend say's 'I can't believe we didn't see any birds again!' you tell him that you saw lots of birds, but you didn't say anything early because taking would scare them off and you could have seen more if they had some binoculars. Then a week later your friend comes to your house, with a pair of binoculars and asks if you will come with him again and show him where the birds are and promises that this time he will not tell you to stop talking and that he will listen to you. You both then go bird watching again and both see lots of birds and have a good time.

Sometimes we think that we know best and we don't listen to good advice, so we spend so long persevering, yet not get anywhere and wondering why. It's because if we keep doing the same thing, we are going to keep getting the same results. If somethings not working think to yourself why? Ask yourself what you can do that is going to make the difference and what help or resources you are going to need to reach your intended goal. If someone offers you help take it, don't be a martyr and if you ask for someones opinion respect what they say and take their in put on board. Criticism isn't always bad it can be constructive, when people tell you something question it, think about, analyze it but don't dismiss it because it may be helpful.

The optimist can see what needs to be done and does not see criticism as criticism but as a friend trying to help.

Nothing in life is forever, time goes on and things change and no matter how bad things seem to you right now, try and remind yourself that it not going to be this way always. Scientific breakthroughs happen right when it seems like founding is about to run out. Books are published just when an author is thinking that they can't possibly deal with another rejection. Businesses suddenly start making profits just as they think that they will have to shut shop. These people get these breakthroughs because they still have hope, somewhere inside them there is a little voice that has kept them determined to keep trying right up to the point that success happened for them.

When I first joined hub pages I had been writing for months and I had very little page views, no followers and I had made no money, I was beginning to think that maybe I was not cut out for this after all. So I went for the first time onto the forum to hear what other members of this site had to say, before I knew it I was learning all kinds of things and one post was especially helpful and so true, it said. 'Just write good quality hubs, enjoy it have patience and when you least expect it, it will happen.' So that's what I did I wrote purely for pleasure, I did not check my AdSense and I dipped in and out of the forum for entertainment every now and again. Two years, nearly 500 followers, over ten thousand views and two google checks later I feel like I am making a success of it. But the most important thing to me is that I do it because I love it, the rest is a very welcomed bonus.

Before you immediately dismiss this statement, I would like you to try to suspend your disbelief even if its just while you read the rest of this section of the article. I would like you to put everything you have ever come to believe about you and your situation in a box and place it in the back of your mind, just temporarily, you can take them all back out at the end (if you still feel like you want them).

I am going to demonstrate my point by giving you an example of how this theory works by using a true event that has happened to me in my life. At the age of 28 I was diagnosed with cervical cancer and I had to have a radical hysterectomy, I worked a double shift and finished work at ten o'clock at night, this was not unusual only this time I was walking home knowing that the next day I was going to have my operation. The operation was a success with no complications and all the cancer cells had been removed, but instead of feeling grateful I took it all for granted and didn't appreciate how lucky I had been at all. For the following six months I was in recovery and physically not able to do much, I found this very difficult as I was used to being a very busy and active person. For a while I started to feel very sorry for myself and started to walk the familiar road of 'why me' and 'it's not fair'. All I could seem to think about was how unfair it was that I was unable to go to work and do all of the other things that I used to be able to do easily, all these negative thoughts were making me miserable and I was not helping myself one little bit. I even stopped writing which was of course a ridiculous thing to do, because that was one of the things I could still do. It took me a while to realise what a waste of time that all was because about half way through the recovery of my operation, I caught the flu and it was the worse bout of flu I had ever had in my life, but instead of thinking 'great another thing to worry about' I thought 'I've survived cancer, dealing with this will be easy' and it was. Just a few days later I was feeling great, I was feeling better then I had for ages.

Iv'e come to realise that cancer was not the end of my life, but the beginning and any other issue that has arisen I just compare it to that and other major things I have already dealt with in the past and got through the other side so that anything else since has seemed like no big deal.

If you can get over a major disaster or set back or illness or indeed anything that throws your life into turmoil and get through the other side, any other problem that you encounter will seem trivial and you will be able to deal with it, with great ease.

Everything in life is hard before it becomes easy, the most challenging of tasks are at there most difficult right at the beginning. Learning to read is difficult at first, look how easy you find it now, starting up a business is difficult at the beginning and easier when everything is set up. Starting a new job can be daunting, but you soon learn the ropes. The more you practice some thing the easier it becomes and that includes life. If your still not convinced then you can take all of your old beliefs back out of that box now, however if your now thinking differently about your life and yourself, you might want to just leave them in that box where you left them.