Are you a cup half full or empty kind of person?

I’m seeing a lot of people juggling life, and dealing with various challenges right now:  everything from financial concerns and worries; fears and uncertainty about their job security and longer-term prospects; people feeling under pressure to work way longer hours as more is being expected of them – then finding themselves completely run down as a result – and those who are working equally as hard for themselves, and finding it much more difficult to do business. All in all, not the easiest of times to remain optimistic…!

So, it got me thinking: how is it that some people find it easier to remain optimistic, despite the most difficult of circumstances, whilst others, in a similar position, really battle to keep things in perspective? Would you describe yourself as a ‘cup half full’ or ‘half empty’ kind of person?

It reminded me of the book Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life written by Professor Martin Seligman, the founder of Positive Psychology, and a leader in the field of improving peoples’ life satisfaction and wellbeing. According to the book, the answer could lie in your explanatory style – that’s not just in terms of the language you use (important though that is) but your particular way in which you explain good or bad events

Your explanatory style

The book talks of three crucial dimensions to explanatory style: permanence, pervasiveness and personalisation, which, depending on our particular style, will reveal how optimistic we are. The idea is that once we are more aware of our style, we can improve it to boost our levels of optimism.

1 Permanence v temporary

The first dimension is permanence v temporary: people who view bad things that happen to them as permanent can feel that the bad event will always affect their lives: people who are more optimistic tend to believe that the causes of bad events are temporary. So, for instance, someone who has more of a permanent pessimistic explanatory style might say things like “Diets never work”, “I’m useless at tennis”, “You never talk to me” whereas someone with a more optimistic style would say “Diets don’t work if you don’t exercise too”, “I’m useless at tennis when I don’t practice” or “You haven’t talked to me lately”.

You’ll also see the immediate difference in that people who tend to explain bad things in terms of definitive statements, using words like always and never, have a permanent, pessimistic style. Optimistic people are more likely to qualify what they say with words like lately or sometimes and view bad events as temporary. This helps to explain why some people can be blindsided by bad events, whilst others can quickly bounce back.

2 Pervasiveness: specific v universal

The second dimension relates to pervasiveness: that is the extent to which people are able to experience a bad event, and yet not let that affect other areas of their lives. We all know people who are having trouble in one area of their life say, their work or relationship, but are still able to go about their daily lives. Others can find it harder not to let that one thing affect everything else that’s going on. A pessimistic person is more likely to make universal explanations when they are experiencing a bad event, whereas someone who’s more optimistic will talk in specifics. For example, someone with more of a pessimistic style going through a bad time in their relationship, might say “I’m repulsive” whereas the more optimistic person would say “I’m repulsive to him/her”.

I particularly liked a story in the book of two people who have been made redundant from the same firm called Nora and Kevin. Nora is offered temporary work back where she was fired and thinks to herself “they realised they can’t cope without me”. Kevin got the same offer and thought “they must really be shorthanded.”

3 Personalisation: internal v external

The third dimension relates to the extent we tend to personalise things – which is so key in terms of the way we talk to ourselves! When bad things happen, we can blame ourselves – internalise – or we can blame other people or circumstances – externalise. The book also explains that people who blame themselves when they fail at something, for example, tend to have low self-esteem as a consequence. People who blame external events do not lose their self-esteem. So, people who tend to personalise things more (internal) might say “I’m stupid” or “I have no talent at x”, whereas the more optimistic person would say “You’re stupid” or “I have no luck at x” (external).

It’s interesting to note that the optimistic style of explaining good events is the opposite of that used for bad events. People who believe good events have permanent causes are more optimistic than people who believe they have temporary causes. Likewise, the optimist believes that bad events have specific causes, while the pessimist believes that good events are caused by specific factors. And people who believe they cause good things to happen tend to like themselves better than people who believe good things come from other people or circumstances. So, if something good happens, the more optimistic person might say “I can take advantage of luck” (internal) whereas a more pessimistic person might say “That was a stroke of luck” (external).

You can find out much more about Positive Psychology and the study of wellbeing at Professor Seligman’s website Authentic Happiness, including some great questionnaires you can use to test out your happiness levels.

I hope this has given you optimistic food for thought. I’m guessing we’ll all recognise some of ourselves in the examples given here to greater and lesser degrees, but it’s good to know we can catch ourselves out and choose a more optimistic conversation style! What are some of the ways you might now begin to have a different conversation with yourself to help improve your optimism levels?