Can You Make Any Difference?

MY MAIN MISSION WITH this blog is to reduce the amount of unnecessary negative emotion people endure. In learning to use the undemoralizing methods, I have realized that much of the worrying I used to do, and much of the demoralization I felt after setbacks, and much of the frustration I felt because my aspirations kept petering out, all of this was unnecessary negative emotion. The bad feelings were a response to my thought-mistakes rather than a response to the real world.

I'm not the only one. So I'm going to do something about it. If you're reading this, you probably want to do something about it too. Can we make any difference? A positive thinker would jump up and say, "Of course! We can change the world!" But that's just faith, or a kind of pumped-up certainty about something they're not really certain about. It's trying to make it so by saying it's so. It's phony.

Crushing pessimism is different than positive thinking. To successfully clear your head (or anyone else's) of pessimism, you have to be dealing with the facts. What do we know for sure? The world is more negative and pessimistic than it needs to be. That's for sure. And we are motivated to change it.

That's all we need. We don't need false certainty. We don't need "belief." The truth is, we don't really know for sure if the world can become a less pessimistic place. But we can go in that direction anyway, and give it our best.

This is a great task in my opinion, and if you're reading this, you probably think so too. It might be difficult, and it might even be impossible. But it is a fight worth fighting. This is like all the best stories that have ever sent a tingle up your spine and brought tears to your eyes: We will pit our skills against the forces of darkness. Will we win? It depends on how well we do. It is not a certainty. If we knew we would win for sure, it wouldn't be a challenge, so it wouldn't be as fun. The fact that we can fail allows it to be engaging, challenging, and ... FUN!

So choose yourself a task. Give yourself a mission. What are you going to do today to help crush pessimism? Do one thing. If it doesn't work out the way you expected, and that makes you feel demoralized or lose motivation about this mission, undemoralize yourself and carry on. Learn from your failures. They are sometimes more instructive than the successes.

If you've ever watched movies of heroic battles, and wished you lived in such challenging times or had such a mighty purpose, wish no more. Crushing pessimism is a challenge worthy of your highest potential.