Optimism is a Learnable Skill

"What if optimism is a learned skill, one that can be permanently acquired?"

Seligman’s team studied pessimism by inducing helplessness in dogs. These dogs learned that nothing they did turned off the mild shocks in their cages, so even when they could escape, they didn’t.

About a third of the dogs, though, never succumbed. They couldn’t be forced to feel helpless. What if this immunity could be learned?

When helpless dogs were pulled back and forth over a small divider, repeatedly shown they could escape the shocks, 100% unlearned the helplessness.

Unlearned it so well that they were inoculated against helplessness for life.

Experiments with humans, using frustrating puzzles and noises, produced identical results. Helplessness could be learned, and it could be unlearned. Once it was unlearned, the effects were permanent.

Changing Our Belief About Adversity Changes its Consequence

"We have found over the years that positive statements you make to yourself have little if any effect. What is crucial is what you think when you fail, using the power of 'non-negative thinking.'"

Knowing a positive perspective in the face of adversity was based on beliefs, Seligman’s team created a process to learn optimism by exploring different beliefs using a system Seligman calls ABCDE.

When you suffer some Adversity, if you analyze what you Believe about it you’ll see the Consequences as a logical result.

What if you change your Belief?

For instance, the boss asks you to rewrite the conclusion of your report (Adversity.)

If your Belief is “The boss is looking for an excuse to fire me” the Consequences will be bad feelings and poor performance.

If you changed your Belief to “This report must be extremely important upstairs” the Consequences could be determination and an excellent job.

That’s ABC: Adversity, Belief, Consequences.

D is Disputation: reasoning ourselves into accepting another Belief. I’ll cover this in more detail in insight #2.

E is Energization: what we’re motivated to do because we’ve Disputed a pessimistic Belief.

For the next two weeks, every time something goes wrong, write down the ABCs:

• What was the Adversity?
• What did you Believe about it?
• What were the Consequences (feelings and actions)?

Once you’ve recognize those ABCs, it’s time to inject some Disputation into the process.

Disputing Negative Thinking by Analyzing Evidence, Alternatives, Implications, and Usefulness

"Learned optimism works not through an unjustifiable positivity about the world but through the power of 'non-negative' thinking."

The Disputation process involves another acronym: EAIU, for Evidence, Alternatives, Implications, and Usefulness.

• What does the Evidence say? The most effective way to dispute a negative belief is to realize it is factually inaccurate. In the example above, if you have Evidence that, in fact, the boss values you and there are no plans to park you at the curb, it’s easier to change your belief.
• Is there an Alternative explanation? Most adversities have multiple contributing factors. Focusing on those which are changeable, specific to the current circumstances, and non-personal leads to optimistic beliefs.
• What are the true Implications of the adversity? In a process called decatastrophizing, when we consider that the most likely negative consequence is relatively minor compared to the “end of the world” scenario we first conjured up, our beliefs lead to more optimistic consequences.
• Finally, what if it turns out our belief is, in fact, true? Does that automatically make it Useful? Maybe blowing your diet (adversity) makes you think you’re a glutton (belief). Even if that were true, is it helpful? It’s more helpful to focus on what we can change (“I need help with my eating habits.”)

Should you decide the belief is true, and there’s nothing you can do about it right now, distraction techniques can keep you from ruminating on the adversity, which is a prime cause of pessimism and depression.

Seligman’s research began in earnest about the time I was 15 years old. If I’d known that someone somewhere was researching how we could choose to be optimists, I would have rejoiced. Also, I would have found them and forced the answer from them and changed my life.