Episode II: Optimism vs Pessimism

I just wanted to start off by saying thank you for your support of iSight thus far. I truly didn’t expect my voice to be heard and I REALLY didn’t expect my work in Episode 1 to be so well-received. Life has been pretty hectic with a thesis draft, problem set, quiz, and a presentation all due this week; however, while incredibly busy, I still had a memorable conversation that sparked this week’s episode of iSight. I got lunch with one of my close friends on campus Tuesday and they asked me about Episode 1, so I asked him about what they learned.

They said, “I just realized how pessimistic I can be.” 

“What do you mean by that?” 

They answered, “I expect disappointment in life because of the things that I’ve seen.”

“Now, is that a way to live life? Expecting to be let down on every corner?”

“No, but the world around me is all that I know. I don’t expect anything different than what I’ve seen. Luke, how do you manage to be so optimistic?”

“Good question.”

I sat there for a solid 30 seconds in silence, thinking about the best way to explain why. I haven’t always been optimistic about the world; in fact, I only saw the world pessimistically for a long time. So, before explaining why, I asked them about the way they see the world now to compare to the way I used to think.

“When you say pessimism, does that expectation of disappointment transfer over to any other parts of your life?”

“Oh, absolutely,” they said. “I expect the worst out of myself sometimes, too. When I get pessimistic, I get stuck and can’t seem to wiggle my way out of it, so I sometimes get really sad and anxious when I’m alone.”

Right after they said that I knew we were on the same page. Pessimism can carry to other aspects of your life, especially with your mental health. The expected disappointment in others can very easily lead to reflecting on things that you’re mad at yourself about. This leads to self-disappointment. When people are mad at themselves, they lower their standards; those actions with lower standards while already being mad lead to even more self-disappointment. Even more self-disappointment leads to even lower standards and, with those actions, guess what you feel? Even MORE self-disappointment. This vicious cycle leads to a point where you feel so stuck by your lowered standards and exponentially increased self-disappointment that anxiety and depression stop by to haunt your subconscious. Pessimism is bigger than expecting disappointment; it’s a mindset. 

“I know that feeling all too well, my friend. I’ve been stuck to the point where I didn’t know if I could keep going, but I ended up getting out of it.”

“How?”

“Here’s how I got myself out of it.”

——————— 

It’s October of 2019 during my sophomore year of college. I wasn’t good enough at football to be playing yet, but my ego wasn’t ready to accept that. It’s hard to accept failure when something you’ve worked so damn hard for is all that you’ve wanted for (up to this point) eleven years. My dream was to play football, not watch it. But guess what ended up happening? Me watching on Saturdays, not playing. Sometimes, your best efforts aren’t good enough, but I wasn’t ready to accept that reality. So, I became pessimistic. Every day, I’d go to practice mad at the thing I couldn’t control (playing time) and expecting daily disappointment. When I got back to my room, I was always a mess because my head was everywhere but in reality. Why can’t you just get better? You’re such a disappointment. You’re better than this. I did extra lifts and mobility sessions, studied the playbook for many extra hours, watched hours and hours of film, repeated the footwork I messed up until I got it, and still cursed myself out for not being good enough. Every single day, I felt like a failure over something I wasn’t ready for and couldn’t control. I expected people to belittle me for not playing because I wasn’t playing, so I started building a coping mechanism: covering my tracks. People cover their tracks through a multitude of methods; mine was doing anything but accepting reality to protect my ego. I just ended up being more disappointed in myself for having to protect my ego. This led to lowered standards. My grades PLUMMETED amidst this struggle. If I can fail on the field, I can fail in the classroom. You’re a failure, Luke. I have a decent 3.4 GPA at Princeton, but this number would be a 3.52 (yes, I did the math on this one) if I didn’t lower my academic standards during my sophomore fall. The anxiety and depression from self-disappointment and lowered academic standards worsened as my focus shifted away from the classroom to the football field and led to even more self-disappointment. Inevitably, it reached a point where I was so low that I didn’t know if I could make it through the semester. Pessimism carried into other parts of my life and was why my mental health suffered. But somehow, I got out of that loop. Wanna know how?

Things changed when I proved to myself that I was good enough to play. As mentioned before, I dedicated almost all of my time to football and hyper-focused on it. Fueled by self-disappointment, anxiety, and depression, I spent an extra 5-6 hours a day on top of the normal 30-40 hours a week working on my craft to get a chance in practice, and, during week eight of my sophomore season, I did. A coach kicked me off of the scout team because I was beating our best defensive players; for context, the scout team is where you run plays that the other team runs to help the defense prepare for the game. I got my chance with the starters and backups and when I did, I played some great football. I wasn’t good enough before, but when I got to play with the older guys, I proved to myself and everyone else that I was. So, the self-disappointment went away. Even though my offensive line coach kept the same rotation (reasonable decision) and I didn’t end up in a game, I knew that I was good enough to be competing for a chance because of the effort I put in and was completely fine with the result. Then, immediately after I got off of the scout team, it finally hit me: I couldn’t control the rotation. Who plays wasn’t in my control and never would be. So, I played for pride and it all worked out. As a byproduct of that newfound pride, my academic standards rose. I pulled my grades out of the gutter through sheer willpower to a manageable GPA. It wasn’t easy by any means, but the grades went up and I vowed to never academically struggle again. My last realization came later that night: I need to stop covering my tracks. Social image isn’t self-validation. It never has been and never will be. Once that last realization came, I did my best to make amends for covering my tracks, and never did I lower my standards again. When I was given a reason to be optimistic, I took it, fully ran with it, and haven’t looked back since. Even when I endured other struggles, my standards never lowered to that point. I broke that loop for good.

———————

After telling my friend about my sophomore fall, they were taken aback by the struggles I endured. This person is a big empath, too, so they felt the same shift in energy from when I was pessimistic to when I was optimistic. It’s noticeable. They thanked me for sharing and called out that energy change. We were on the same page, speaking the same language with optimism and pessimism. 

They then asked, “How did you stick to that? I always lose that sight of what’s good in people and expect disappointment.”

Once I saw some good that defied my expected disappointment, I vowed to never stop searching for the good in people. If people don’t meet your standards, it’s on them, not you. This isn’t to say that pessimism is a bad thing; expecting disappointment eases the blow of people disappointing you and makes accepting how shitty the world can be easier. However, pessimism easily transfers to how you view yourself if you can’t compartmentalize it into external and internal disappointment. It becomes a catastrophic mindset if that pessimism becomes internal. I was lucky to have received external validation to get out of it, but if you can’t compartmentalize, anxiety and depression will follow. Optimism, on the other hand, allows you to focus only on what’s good in the world. While you will often be disappointed by others not meeting your standards, realizing that you can’t control their actions makes it that much easier to move on. People tell you who they really are, so if they let you down, recognize the disappointment and move on from the negativity. If you’re stuck with that person, try to find the good in them. It’ll make interactions with them more tolerable if there’s even the smallest glimpse of good in them. If you keep this mindset, life becomes much more fun and exciting. It’s easier to be in the moment and find good things that will keep you going when you look for it all the time. Don’t lose sight of the good in this world and life will reward you for your efforts.

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I can’t cover what the eye can’t see unless you tell me what’s missing from the bigger picture. Let me know what you think, send me any questions you have, and share iSight with the people you care about! The more people who read iSight, the better my writing will be because I will have more concepts to cover. Again, thank you for reading iSight and I am VERY excited to hear your thoughts.