Two Ways of Looking at Life

Your attitude strongly reflects your outlook on life. Take a closer look at that connection. Are you a pessimist-- or an optimist? Can you see how your way of looking actually does color your attitude? And remember: change your outlook and you change your attitude.

Lost

The father is looking down into the crib at his sleeping newborn daughter, just home from the hospital. His heart is overflowing with awe and gratitude for the beauty of her, the perfection.

The baby opens her eyes and stares straight up.

The father calls her name, expecting that she will turn her head and look at him. Her eyes don't move. He picks up a furry little toy attached to the rail of the crib and shakes it, ringing the bell it contains. The baby's eyes don't move.

His heart has begun to beat rapidly. He finds his wife in their bedroom and tells her what just happened. "She doesn't seem to respond to noise at all," he says. "It's as if she can't hear."

"I'm sure she's all right," the wife says, pulling her dressing gown around her. Together they go into the baby's room.

She calls the baby's name, jingles the bell, claps her hands. Then she picks up the baby, who immediately becomes lively and makes happy sounds.

"My God," the father says. "She's deaf."

"No, she's not," the mother says. "I mean, it's too soon to say a thing like that. Look, she's brand-new. Her eyes don't even focus yet." "But there wasn't the slightest movement, even when you clapped as hard as you could."

The mother takes a book from the shelf. "Let's read what's in the baby book," she says. She looks up "heating" and reads out loud:" 'Don't be alarmed if your newborn fails to be startled by loud noises or fails to turn toward sound. Reactions to sound often take some time to develop. Your pediatrician can test your child's hearing neurologically' ."

"There," the mother says. "Doesn't that make you feel better?"

"Not much," the father says. "It doesn't even mention the other possibility, that the baby is deaf. And all I know is that my baby doesn't hear a thing. I've got the worst feeling about this. Maybe it's because my grand-father was deaf. If that beautiful baby is deaf and it's my fault, I'll never forgive myself."

"Hey, wait a minute," says the wife. "You're worrying too much. We'll call the pediatrician first thing Monday. In the meantime, cheer up. Here, hold the baby while I fix her blanket. It's all pulled out."

The father takes the baby but gives her back to his wife as soon as he can. All weekend he finds himself unable to prepare for next week's work. He follows his wife around the house, thinking about the baby's hearing and about the way deafness would ruin her life. He imagines only the worst: no hearing, no development of language, his beautiful child cut off from society, locked in a soundless world. By Sunday night he has sunk into despair.

The mother leaves a message with the pediatrician's answering service asking for an early appointment Monday. She spends the weekend doing her exercises, reading, and trying to calm her husband. The pediatrician's tests are reassuring, but the father's spirits remain low. Not until a week later, when the baby shows her first startle to the loud sound of a passing truck, does he begin to recover and enjoy his new daughter again.

This father and mother have two different ways of looking at the world. Whenever something bad happens to him -- a call from the bank manager, a disagreement with his wife, even a frown from his employer-- he imagines the worst: bankruptcy, jail, divorce, and dismissal. He is prone to depression; he often feels extremely tired; his health suffers. She, on the other hand, sees bad events in their least threatening light. To her, they are temporary challenges to be overcome. After a reversal, she bounces back quickly, and finds all her energy again. Her health is excellent.

The optimists and the pessimists: I have been studying them for the past twenty-five years. The defining characteristic of pessimists is that they tend to believe bad events will last a long time, will undermine everything they do, and are their own fault. The optimists, who are confronted with the same hard knocks of this world, think about misfortune in the opposite way. They tend to believe defeat is just a temporary setback, that its causes are confined to this one case. The optimists believe defeat is not their fault: circumstances, bad luck, or other people brought it about. Such people are not bothered by defeat. Confronted by a bad situation, they perceive it as a challenge and try harder.

These two habits of thinking about causes have consequences. Literally hundreds of studies show that pessimists give up more easily and get depressed more often. These experiments also show that optimists do much better in school and at work. They regularly exceed the predictions of aptitude tests. When optimists run for office, they are more apt to be elected than pessimists are. Their health is unusually good. Evidence suggests they may even live longer.  .......

Twenty-five years of study has convinced me that if we habitually believe, as does the pessimist, that misfortune is our fault, is enduring, and will undermine everything we do, more of it will happen to us than if we believe otherwise. I am also convinced that if we are in the grip of this view, we will get depressed easily, we will accomplish less than our potential, and we will even get physically sick more often. Pessimistic prophecies are self-fulfilling.

共963字

英语学习42页 2001年1月