The other side

Wikipedia defines optimism as an attitude that interprets things in a best or optimized way.  Not always the glass half-filled story can be used to define optimism. It is not about the half empty or the half-filled glass that would define the best things, it is when you are tired almost on the verge to fall and you find this ray of hope which truly changes your mindset about the present.

I would say you can explore the optimist in you any moment. If at all you are driving back from work, with an exhausted stressful mind, all that is required is a cool breeze to awaken the optimist in you.

This thing happened to me very recently. We had our first semester examination, and being a working student it is very difficult to cope up with your studies in parallel to your work. I could hardly finish reading 70% of my syllabus and was extremely worried about the exam.

And then on my way to the exam, we had to board this local train. Across the passage, at the door I saw a very cheerful lady who looked very normal, happy, no worries from her face and according to me, I would have been the most stressed person in that local train, I envied that lady for the kind of carefree attitude she possessed. How lucky is she that she has no unprepared university exams to attend.

Trying to be the positive one, I made myself believe that the exam is going to be in my favor. I stood up from my seat to walk towards the door. To my surprise this lady looked way different than what she seemed to me from my seat. What I had not seen was her walking stick and a handicapped leg. That was not the end of the story. Beside her was a bag of Hair clips and other accessories which took me no time to realize she was a saleswoman, to be precise train-to-train saleswoman. And when the train halted at the next railway station she gracefully got down the train onto the platform with the support of her walking stick and lifted the bag balancing it very well on her right shoulder. For a moment it made me rethink about my luck. Her cheerful attitude to the hardships in her life is what you call optimism.

And then I realized, I have a chance to attempt my exams, perhaps a pass or a failed result. But it would not make my life any harder; in fact I might get another chance as well to give a second attempt at the very same exam. There are not many people who get chances or have hopes for another attempt at the exams in their life. Compared to their problems, the exam stress I underwent was insignificant. And that is how a real life inspired the optimist in me and I learnt what optimism is.

It is not just a perception, But living one’s life according to that perception. Check that here