There is always a first time for everything. Here’s why it helps to be realistic.
Imagine you are in a dark place.
There are several ways to think about what is happening to you.
- You are six feet under, buried or…
- You are in the ground, planted.
Which would you choose? Your answer can say a lot about your perception. Either you have an optimistic view, a pessimistic view, or a realistic view.
We like to think being optimistic makes us immune to misfortune. It seems we have an innate knowledge that something unforeseen can’t happen to us if we take all the necessary precautions or pray that it won’t happen.
How Optimism Tests You
When my son was born at 36 weeks, he spent the following two in the NICU. It was heartbreaking. I never had the luxury of time to deal with the accompanying emotions. Every day was a different battle. One morning, as I walked towards his room, I noticed the doctors performing a spinal tap on one of the babies.
Since I previously worked in the medical field, I was aware of the procedure. My heart bled, and I secretly thanked God that my baby wouldn’t have to go through that. The next day, I entered the hospital and made my way to the NICU. Another spinal tap procedure was underway. My heart bled for the umpteenth time. Without another thought, I carried on to see my baby.
He wasn’t in his room, in his cot. The anxiety set in. My husband and I walked out, and this time we carefully watched as the doctor and nurse finished the spinal tap procedure on our baby. The tears flowed as my worst nightmare came to life. I was in disbelief. When sitting in the parents’ lounge, the nurses would come by and reassure me.
“He is going to be fine. Babies are resilient,” they would say. “You need to be strong.”
How could I? They knew that, as they saw it every day. I was a first-time mom and found it hard to swallow. What guarantee could they give me?
That was my first time — as a parent — thinking “it won’t happen to me.”
There is a first time for everything.
Hope for the Best; Prepare for the Worst
I hoped for the best I even prepared for the best. As a couple, we went for prenatal classes. They covered everything from pregnancy to birth, but not what would happen if my baby ended up in the NICU.
How did I deal with it at the time? I mean, it could have gone either way. There were babies in isolation units. Not long after, call it Murphy’s law or whatever you like, my baby ended up in one of those units.
The only way I was able to get through that was to be optimistic. I was told all the time by friends, family, nurses, and paediatricians, that babies are resilient. But how could I also believe that when babies were in the NICU for months? How do you prepare for something like that?
Is It Realistic to Be Optimistic?
Say hello to optimism bias: a well-known psychological phenomenon that causes you to believe you are less at risk of experiencing misfortune than others and overestimating the likelihood of positive events happening.
You don’t need research to show how people dismiss unfortunate events, and even when it does happen, they refuse to take the necessary steps to prepare. In natural disasters, people remain in their homes because they think the danger won’t affect them. Yet, they see people heeding the advice and evacuating, only to need rescuing after.
We all watch these events happening to others and think it will never happen to us. That is why we cannot cope with them. To be prepared, we must look at all the possibilities.
Why do we prepare for a fire by doing drills, making exit strategies in our homes, and keeping fire extinguishers? So in the event of a fire, we are prepared and know exactly how to deal with it. You don’t think your house is fire-proof and leave it at that.
Tali Sharot, a cognitive neuroscientist, says divorce rates in the Western world are about 40%. But newlyweds estimate it at 0%, substantially underestimating their probability of divorce. They are more optimistic than realistic. Yet, their optimism carries forward when they decide to remarry with the prospect of doing better the second or third time around.
I am convinced that my marriage would be prosperous because I took the vows — for better or worse till death do us part. Maybe this made me go through life, avoiding the worst. I’ve seen other couples divorce, thinking it would never happen to me and how could they take their vows so lightly.
We refuse to want to see otherwise, to see reality. So when my marriage took a turn, I took a long look in the mirror to accept realism. Marriage tests us with the good and the bad.
I am convinced that my children will have a better future than most kids, and they are above average in IQ. Nothing untoward can befall them on my watch.
Does optimism bias influence parent predictions of childhood-obesity-related disease risks? — the title of a study conducted in 2015 showed that parents acknowledge childhood obesity as a problem in society. But not as a risk factor for their children. The study highlights parents’ biases around childhood obesity, skewed by optimism bias.
Strategies to Overcome Optimism Bias
While being overly optimistic can give you a false state of invincibility, you need to have a balanced view of life and prepare for most things that can happen to you and your children.
“The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.”
— William A. Ward
- Being an optimist all the time can be crippling. Stay positive, but at the same time, be realistic.
- By welcoming stress, we can feel less invincible, and the better we can cope with unexpected events. Avoiding stress in my marriage when I knew it needed addressing was more detrimental.
- Many people told me babies are resilient. What makes them resilient is their will to live. So why can’t we be resilient? Optimism and resilience go well together.
- Take any misfortune in your stride by taking it one day at a time. Deal with it at a pace you can manage. There is no other way. I couldn’t rush the process when my baby was fighting to survive.
- Get all the information you need to feel comfortable in the situation. I asked the doctors and nurses everything I could to understand every scenario. We want protection from feeling more pain, but honestly, the truth will free you, no matter how hard it is to hear.
- Learn to lean on yourself. Yes, you will have the support of your family and friends, but learn to depend on yourself. Muster up inner courage and faith.
- Look to the plights of others. We can’t only live in our minds, to see reality, look around us. Understand that the estimate of something happening to someone else is the same for you and your family.
- Changing your perception of reality can motivate you to change your behaviour and outlook.
- Think back to experiences in the past, especially those of a negative nature. Understand that they happened and they can happen, even though you were very confident they couldn’t happen to you.
“I always like to look on the optimistic side of life, but I am realistic enough to know that life is a complex matter.”
— Walt Disney