 All right. So let's start with why be optimistic, why it's important. And here I want to... I don't mean by optimistic being polyanish. I don't mean by optimistic massaging the facts of reality to be somehow positive. I don't mean optimistic by being delusional. I mean by optimistic as having a basic positive view of the future based on rational facts, based on reality. And I can certainly see circumstances which you can be optimistic. Just things are so bad that optimism is impossible. But why is it important to live for a healthy life, to be optimistic or to live in an environment to live in a world where you can be optimistic and I'll make the case that we could still be optimistic in this world. Because life entails action. And life entails action into the future. Indeed, we live in the present, but we're constantly moving towards a future and creating a future. We're constantly thinking about the future, planning for the future and acting now for the future. And it is impossible, impossible to act into the future and to be successful in acting into the future and to be energized about acting into the future and to be committed to the future if you think the future is bleak and horrible and depressing and nothing can be achieved and your life is just one long miserable. I mean, what's the point? How can one plan for what horizon? If failure is the name of the game, then why plan? Why think about the future? Why plan for the future? Why live? And it's impossible to be happy. So to be happy, to be successful, one needs an attitude that is based on reason, on fact, on reality, but an attitude that says I can't achieve in the future. I can succeed. My actions will bring, or at least with a high probability, bring positive outcome. This is not futile what I'm doing. What I'm doing is going to lead to something better, to achieving my values. I mean, pessimism is the attitude of my values are unachievable. It's not possible. Optimism is the attitude that says my values are achievable. I can't achieve them. They can be gotten. I will not give up and I will fight for them because in this world with all its problems, I can still achieve my values, at least some of them, if not all of them. And that is a necessary attitude. It's a necessary frame of mind to be successful at life. It's a necessary frame of mind to go after a new job, to pursue a new career, to pursue an existing career, to pursue a raise, to pursue a promotion, to study a new area, to go into a new field. It's a necessary condition to try dating, to go after a relationship, friendship, love. If you are convinced that it will fail, you will not try. If you're convinced that you're going to fail, you're not going to succeed. What's the point of planning? What's the point in thinking? What's the point in thinking? What's the point in acting? So to act into the future requires a belief, again, based on facts, based on reality, that achievement can be achieved. Values can be attained. Is that positive view about life, about values? Needs to be there. Otherwise, you're paralyzed. You're paralyzed either into hedonism or into just passivity. And then pessimism is to a large extent a self-fulfitting prophecy. Because when you stop believing in the future, when you stop believing in your ability to attain values, when you stop believing in your efficaciousness in the world, or that the world is open to you, then you stop acting. Then you stop making no sense happen. And then all of that negativity is exactly what happens out of default. The default, when you don't act, is failure. Inaction is failure. So a positive sense about the future, at least an important realm in your life, is crucial if you want to live a successful happy life. And, of course, that positive sense about the future has to be, optimally is, related to the values that are most important to you, to the things that you care about most, to the things that advance your life most. If, yes, you can be successful in the minor stuff in life, but the important stuff in life you're an absolute failure at, then it's very hard. It's very hard to actually keep that motivation, and keep that drive, and keep that positivity. Say, once you want to make it in the important aspects of life, and what are the important aspects of life? What are the parts of life that are most important to the achievement of happiness? What are the parts in life which are most significant to all of us as individuals that make our life better, that we want to be successful in? And that if we are, we'll have the biggest impact on our lives. And if we're not, we'll have the biggest impact on our lives. Well, what are they? What are those areas in life? Well, balance is relationships. Absolutely, relationships, right? Your friendships, your romantic relationships, your family, these are hugely important. And you want to have healthy relationships there. You want to build those relationships. You want to act towards that. And you, in that context, you want to make sure that you act in ways that promote a good relationship into the future. You can control them. Sometimes a good relationship turns into a horrible relationship. Somebody, somebody, sometimes somebody you're close to will stab you in the back. But if you let that destroy your capacity to plan for the future, to act towards good relationships, then you've given up on this crucial, important value that you have that is necessary for you to have a happy life, a successful life. See, to have that successful life, you have to be able to project into the future and you have to act towards it. And if you give up, you can't have that. You won't gain that value. Adam says, finding a purpose and being productive. Yeah, having a, having a career. I mean, career is crucially important in your life. And you've want to develop a positive attitude towards your career. If your career is, and I've said this many times in the show, if your career is no good, if it's a dead end, if you're struggling, if you don't like it, if you're not enjoying it, you don't see a future in it. If you cannot be optimistic about your career where you are right now, then do something about it. Because it's crucial that you have a positive view of your career. It's crucial that you're ready to act to make your career better. You act to make your life in this realm better, that you act to do well, to succeed. And it's not completely in your control, not relationships and not a career. But in most, both cases, it's mostly in your control. You get to decide who you have a relationship with or not. You get to decide who to get close to or not. You get to decide whether you're going to initiate, whether you're going to seek out relationships, where you're going to find friends, where you get, or whether you're going to be passive about it. This is something that's very much in your control. Make it happen. Make it good. Again, you're going to fail. We all fail. Failure is part of trying. Failure is part of living. It's what you do with that failure, what you learn from that failure. And whether you're willing to get up and try again and try again and try again. And the same with the career. Not the first career you choose won't necessarily be the one that you stick with. You might have to change. You don't have to try, but it's in your control. Yes, you might have a lousy boss. You might have a lousy company that might lay you off for no reason. Lots of things might happen. But at the end of the day, your career is in your control, particularly in a job market like today, where there's a huge shortage of good people. So be courageous, be brave, be willing to change. You want to be in a place in your life where your career, which is under your control, is something you're positive about. You're living for an ever better future career-wise. So you got relationships, you got career. I don't know. What else is important? What is crucial to your life, to your happiness, to your success? Let's see. Yeah, what you do for a living, we just talked about. Yeah, have a reason why you want to live. Yeah, but a lot of that has to do with having a purpose, having a career, and being able to have that positive view of the future. But what else is important to you guys? Relationships here, career, anything else? Well, art, Jennifer says, art, absolutely. Art has a huge value in life. Hobbies have huge value in life. Now, who controls the art that you get to experience? You do. So make it a positive experience. Figure out what you like. Figure out what you don't. Expose yourself to more and more of what you like. Give yourself that energy, that satisfaction, that pleasure, that enjoyment that comes from experiencing art. But you are in control of it. Nobody else. Therefore, you can create a positive future. Save up money to buy a beautiful sculpture like that one. Save up money to buy a beautiful painting. Save up money to go to a concert, to go to a museum, to go on a trip. So art is in your control. You can be optimistic about art because there's plenty of good art out there. And it's under your control whether you choose it or not. Nobody can take it away from you. With the internet, there's an endless amount of good art. Endless amount of good art. Pleasure. Stephen says pleasure. Yeah, I mean, all kinds of pleasures, whether it's pleasure you get from art, whether it's pleasure you get from sex, whether it's pleasure you get from great conversation, whether it's pleasure you get from listening to your own book show, whether it's pleasure you get from a good massage. Again, under your control, you get to set the terms. And there's no reason to be pessimistic about it. You can create a world. You can create your life to have pleasure in it. Ryan says a sense of accomplishment. I mean, that comes primarily from work. Again, go do it. Get it. Get it done. Achieve it. Had a plan. Be optimistic about it. You can't accomplish stuff. As long as you set your goals appropriately. And if you can't accomplish things here, go somewhere else. Move. Take control over your accomplishments. When a female says health, loyals herself. Yeah, again, this is not a passive activity. Find a good doctor. Get up. Get a overall evaluation. Change your diet. Exercise. Study. Figure out what's healthy or not. Now, accidents will happen like this five year old girl getting cancer, which is, but even there, I mean, there's nothing good about this. But medicine has advanced so much that the chances for surviving are very, very good. The doctors, they're amazing doctors out there. There's amazing technology out there. There are amazing drugs out there. We live in a world in which many of the diseases one gets can be cured, can be dealt with as hard as it is, as difficult as it is. What used to be death sentences are no longer. But again, you have to act. You have to do it. All right. Others say, yes, as health relationships, career, financial stability, and personal hobbies, learning, volunteer, if you like, etc. You didn't have art. Art should definitely be in your big five. And financial stability is really linked to your career. I guess you could separate them out. But again, all in your control. Now notice, you know, somebody says a dog, good meal, cats and rabbits, goldfish, hamsters, not sure what any of that has to do with anything, possums, yeah, having a pet, that's good. Note that on the values that we have talked about so far, that are really necessary for happiness, for flourishing, for being successful as a human being. They're all values that are in your control. They're all values that no matter what happens in Washington DC, up to a point, we'll talk about that up to a point, no matter what the truckers do or don't do, no matter what you do, does or doesn't do, up to a point, all of those are achievable, or at least in different scenarios, many of them are achievable, in spite of the crummy, horrible, disgusting state of the world. I mean, all of that is to illustrate that if you focus on the things that matter to you, on the personal values that are important to you, on your relationships, on your career, on art that you love, on your pets, on your, I don't know, whatever, you will achieve success and you can be optimistic because in every one of those realms, you get to control it, you get to control it. Now it is true, the things could get a lot worse. Under dictatorship, a lot of the things that we can control now, we can't control under dictatorship. Many of the things that we take for granted today disappear and go away. All of that is true and it's why you should care about politics and you shouldn't just ignore it. But it's also true that we don't live in a dictatorship. In spite of COVID lockdowns, we don't live in a dictatorship yet. One likely to live in a dictatorship anytime really soon and that there's very little you as an individual can do to prevent whatever catastrophic dictatorship is coming down. I mean, not to say you shouldn't do anything. So why am I optimistic? How do I stay optimistic? Because I'm focused on the values that are important to me. I'm focused on achieving the things that make my life good, that make my life happy, that make my life fulfilling. And I don't let the things I don't have control over. I don't let the macro political situation as bad and as dark and as bleak as it is get me down too much. One of the women says, Yuan, don't visit Russia. I visited Russia. Russia's bleak. Russia's not my favorite place indeed of all the places I visited in the world. Russia's maybe among my least favorite places because it's bleak. Partially it's the weather. Partially it's the people, although there are some wonderful Russians but in Russia and it's just an atmosphere of bleakness and of oppression. But most of us don't live in Russia. And if you live in Russia, get out. Again, something you can control. It's not the Soviet Union. You don't have to risk your life and climb a wall and get shot at in order to leave. Take control over your life. That is the source of optimism. If you know your life is in your control, if you know your career is in your control, the art that you experience is in your control. The place that you live is in your control. The relationships you have are in your control. That is the most important values in your life are in your control. And you are rational and confident and have some self-esteem, then how can you not be optimistic about your life? Maybe not about the world. Maybe not about three generations from now. But what really matters is your optimism about you, about your life, about where you're going, where you're heading, about your ability to achieve your values. Thank you for listening or watching The Iran Book Show. If you'd like to support the show, we make it as easy as possible for you to trade with me. You get value from listening. You get value from watching. Show your appreciation. You can do that by going to iranbookshow.com slash support by going to Patreon, subscribe star locals, and just making an appropriate contribution on any one of those channels. Also, if you'd like to see The Iran Book Show grow, please consider sharing our content and, of course, subscribe. 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