How to Reclaim Optimism When You’ve Become a Pessimist
As a child, I had been a perpetual optimist. At least that’s what people told me perpetually. My optimistic nature kept me alive through much of my war- torn childhood. Half-full glasses make us buoyant.
Current reality: I am a pessimist
As I endured my tumultuous prodigal years (where the battle scars were of my own doing), I lost my buoyancy. My mind had been seared with despair. When you learn to loathe yourself, the whole world begins to look loathsome.
I was a 25-year old mother of three boys, when my husband’s gently-spoken words would rip through my soul like tsunami leveling houses. “You are such a pessimist,” he whispered. I doubt if he even meant it as an insult so much as an observation.
I tore out of the room, and back to the bedroom. My meeting place with God. Laying my forehead down on the carpet, my lament wafted to the Throne. How had I become the pessimist? No one had ever called me that before. It had always been the opposite. Yet I knew his observation was true, because despair burned in my marrow.
Is there a remedy for pessimism?
I needed a remedy for my mind’s tendencies towards darkness. I turned to my spiral bound notebook (ages before Ann Voskamp had told me this is what I should do), and began etching down a list of things surrounding me, worthy of my appreciation. I listed them for days, weeks, maybe months. Some things as broad-sweeping as “Grace.” Some as mundane as “nerve endings” and “toe nails.” And some taught me the rapture of a moment, as I noticed things like “child’s laughter as he delights in his brother” or “breeze tickling bare skin.” All of my excavated discoveries retrained my mind towards gratitude. Every patch of earth became holy ground.
I have since learned that neuroscientists have discovered your brain has pathways, formed both towards gratitude and complaining. Channels, if you will. The more we practice one or the other, the more natural it becomes. In other words, both giving thanks and complaining are habit forming.
I have also since learned that gratitude unlocks contentment and joy.
Another discovery about gratitude
It wouldn’t be too long after my spiral-bound experiment of mind transformation that I would suddenly experience an unrelenting headache lasting six months. The worst part of the headache was not the ache itself, but the accompanying exhaustion. I had three small sons, who seemed bound-and- determined to visit the Emergency Room often enough to befriend the local doctors and nurses. I often felt so tired I would fall asleep during the day, petrified they would do something irrevocably dangerous.
For the first three months, I complained, got tested for a brain tumor, etc. You know, the usual. But after about three months, the Lord convicted me I was not, in fact, obeying either 1 Thessalonians 5:18, or Philippians 4:4-8, both of which tell us to give thanks in all things. Not just thanks for the pleasant things I had scratched down in my notebook.
Solidifying the habit of thanksgiving
I would begin to complain, and the Holy Spirit would nudge. “Thanks for the headache, God,” I would say between clenched teeth, feeling as though my heart was committing treason, and my lips were doing service.
Until a miracle began to take place, and I actually began to become thankful for the headache. I had grown so accustomed to the ache that it was easy to ignore at times, and other times, when the pain felt stabbing, it was a reminder to give thanks. I gave thanks for the reminder to give thanks. God was solidifying the habit. He was forming deeper channels in my brain.
One day, it occurred to me that I hadn’t felt my headache for a few days. For a micro-second, I almost missed it. It had been such a tremendous aid in teaching me to give thanks. But only for a micro-second, before I snapped to my senses and gave thanks that it was gone. Thankfully, the lesson lingered. It has been nearly two decades since anyone has called me a “pessimist,” though I have trodden much muckier trials since, because the habit of thanksgiving is like a suit of armor. It renews our eyes to see God in all things!
Meet Space Welch
Space Welch is a connoisseur of sunsets, memories, rocking chairs, well-worn Bibles, and strangers-turned-friends. She is a wife to Smiles, mama to Forest, EliJAH and Simon Peter (and soon to Claire and Alycia, who are marrying two of her sons). She has a small soap company called “Space Cadet Soaps,” but her deepest art-passions are crafted with words. Above all, she contagiously delights in Jesus, and rests pleasantly in the truth that He delights in her. She “wastes” her life trying to use her passions and talents to point others (and herself) to the loveliness of Christ, because that’s all that matters forever!
You can find more of her musings at spacewelch.com.
Where to find her . . .
Begin Within is a series to inspire a year-round lifestyle of gratitude that will impact not only your own life, but the lives of your neighbors as well. Gratitude is a theme we talk about often around here because it ties so closely into other missional living rhythms. Practicing gratitude reminds to keep our hearts soft and expectant and our eyes open. Therefore, the more we embrace gratitude, the easier it becomes to truly see our neighbors and where we can join what God is already doing in our neighborhoods.
If you would like to contribute to Begin Within, you can find the submission guidelines here.
Creating Ripples
If you would like to cultivate rhythms in addition to gratitude that will empower you live on mission in your neighborhood, check out Cultivating a Missional Life: A 30-Day Devotional to Gently Help You Open Your Heart, Home, and Life to Your Neighbors. This small book will help you make a big impact in your neighborhood as you learn to let missional living flow from the inside out. Get the 30-day missional living challenge free when you purchase the book.
