OPTIMISTS DON’T KNOW WHAT IT’S LIKE TO HAVE BAD LUCK

REALITY

They most definitely experience adversity, but they see the silver lining, says Steven M. Southwick, co-author of the book Resilience. “Instead of catastrophising a situation, optimists tend to take a step back and keep things in perspective,” he says.

Suppose you bungle a presentation. Instead of writing it off as terrible, optimists frame it as, “That was bad. How can I do better in the future?” Experts believe you can develop this type of resilience. “We often overpredict how extreme and long-lasting our negative emotions will be,” says Robert L. Leahy, director of The American Institute for Cognitive Therapy and author of The Worry Cure.

Circumstances don’t drive happiness – it’s your response. For instance, there is more than one way to react to a test that didn’t go well. And an optimist thinks, “Maybe I didn’t study hard enough.

I’ll do something different next time.” In other words, you didn’t fail – your approach did. You’ll think of other strategies to try.