How to Be Hopeful but Realistic

Co-authored by Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC

Last Updated: December 21, 2022 References Approved

Studies have found that optimists tend to have better health, achieve more, and be happier than pessimists.^{[1]
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Trustworthy Source
Harvard Medical School
Harvard Medical School's Educational Site for the Public
Go to source} But, there’s a catch. These positive outcomes are associated with an optimistic but realistic outlook on the world, instead of an outlook that’s unrealistically rosy.^{[2]
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Expert Source

Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Expert Interview. 15 October 2021.} Realistic optimism blends a hopeful mindset with a practical approach to life.^{[3]
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Expert Source

Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Expert Interview. 15 October 2021.} You can learn to harness the power of realistic optimism to achieve your goals and succeed at work, at school, and in your relationships. Get started by nurturing your sense of hope, maintaining a realistic outlook, and battling pessimistic thoughts when they arise.

Part 1

Part 1 of 3:

Cultivating Hope

1
Identify your values. Knowing what you value is essential to cultivating hope. Take some time to think about what your life would look like if money was not a factor and nothing was standing in your way. Describe in writing what your relationships, work life, and environment would look like in an ideal world. This will give you some direction and purpose to help you cultivate hope.
2
Know that you are able to shape your life. To get into a more hopeful state of mind, realize that your future is yours to take control of. You are in charge of deciding what you will achieve.
- Think about what you want your life to be like in a year and realize that, with hard work, you are capable of making it happen.
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3
Be open to new possibilities and adventures in your life. A hopeful mindset thrives on possibilities, so be aware of new opportunities that arise in your life. Exploring different options and choices increases your odds of finding fresh resources to help you achieve your goals.^{[4]
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- The best way to discover new possibilities is to be open. Try striking up a conversation with a stranger, taking a walk with no set destination, or signing up for a class about something you’ve always wanted to learn.
4
Set goals that inspire you. Setting achievable, time-bound, and specific goals can help you become more hopeful by giving you a positive future to look forward to.^{[5]
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Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Expert Interview. 15 October 2021.} Imagine yourself achieving your goal in as much detail as you can, and think about the different routes you can take to get there.^{[6]
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- For example, if you are interested in traveling around the world, you might set a goal to save the money for a plane ticket and other necessities. Then, to get you inspired to work towards the goal on a daily basis, you might imagine, in vivid detail, yourself arriving at your first destination. Think about the sights, sounds, and smells you will encounter to make it seem as real as possible.
- Write your goals down to help make them more concrete and read over them daily to remind yourself what you are working towards.
5
Find reasons to laugh. It’s true that laughter is the best medicine – researchers have found that a daily dose of humor can help people feel more optimistic about the future. Humor inhibits negative thoughts while stimulating positive emotions, which encourages a hopeful state of mind. ^{[7]
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- Watch a comedy or YouTube video. Spend extra time with that silly classmate of yours. Or, offer to babysit your five-year-old nephew.
- See if there is a laughing group in your city. These are groups that meet for the purpose of having a laugh.
6
Focus on gratitude. Thinking about the things you’re grateful for is a powerful way to maintain a hopeful state of mind, even when you’re dealing with difficult circumstances. By focusing on the positive things in your life, no matter how small or large they are, you prime your mind to seek out more positive events and stay optimistic.
- To make gratitude a habit, try keeping a gratitude journal. Every night before you go to bed, take a few minutes to write down several things you felt thankful for that day.
- You can also use a phone app to help remind you to add to your gratitude journal daily.

Part 2

Part 2 of 3:

Staying Realistic

1
Identify cognitive distortions. Cognitive distortions are negative or unrealistic thought patterns that can keep you feeling stressed or depressed. Your mind perceives reality in a distorted manner, leading to rumination or persistent obsessing over negative events or experiences. There are many cognitive distortions recognized in popular psychology. Some are listed below.
- All-or-nothing, or black-and-white thinking- seeing everything in absolutes, either this or that no in-between (e.g. "If they do not love me, they must hate me.")
- Emotional reasoning- attaching your reality to your current emotional state (e.g. "I feel crappy today, so no one will want to be around me.")
- Labeling- identifying shortcomings excessively (e.g. "I'm a loser.")
- Jumping to conclusions- either mind-reading or predicting a negative future by fortune-telling (e.g. "I saw Chelsea today and she didn't speak to me. She must not be my friend anymore" or "I already know I will make myself look like a fool at the talent show.")
- Magnification- blowing things out of proportion (e.g. "I made an F on my English paper. I'm going to fail the class and have to take it over again.")
- Should statements- using "should," "ought to," "have to," or "must" in your self-talk (e.g. "I should have known better than to think he liked me.")
2
Challenge negative thought patterns. One you learn what cognitive distortions are and how to identify them, you need to learn how to attack their logic. Doing this gives you power over your thoughts and teaches you to become a constant observer of what's going through your head. If you notice yourself playing into negative thought patterns, try the following strategies:^{[8]
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- Start by examining the accuracy of your thoughts. For example, you say "No one likes me." You need to pay attention to see if this seems accurate or not in your life.
- Consider the evidence. Are you always alone? Do people purposely try to be with you sometimes? Do your friends and family ever comment about how they enjoy your company?
- Practice mindfulness. It's no fun to beat yourself about your thoughts. When you notice yourself thinking negatively or unrealistically, practice deep breathing and mindfulness. Inhale the positive; exhale the negative. Notice the cognitive distortions, but think of them as ships coming into your harbor. Steer away the negative and allow the positive to safely dock.
3
Take responsibility. Realistic hope involves taking steps to achieve the goals you want, instead of just waiting for good things to happen to you. Research has found that people who take responsibility for their choices and believe in their own self-control tend to do better at overcoming their difficulties.^{[9]
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- Taking responsibility for yourself doesn’t mean trying to control every aspect of your life. Rather, it means taking responsibility for your choices, while accepting that some things are outside your control.
4
Be honest with yourself. Being realistic means becoming aware of your own biases, flaws, and internal assumptions. Having a clear-eyed view of yourself can help you decide which traits and beliefs are helping you and which ones you need to change.^{[10]
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Research source} However, make sure that you do not compare yourself to other people. Just stay focused on yourself.
- Ask yourself which beliefs, either conscious or unconscious, you hold about the world. Are these thought patterns helping you or bringing you down? For example, maybe you have come to believe that people are incapable of fidelity because your last partner cheated on you. How is this helping you? Will it be a positive contribution to your future relationships? No, it won’t.
- If you need help coming up with an objective judgment of your personality, ask a trusted friend for their perspective on your flaws and positive traits. Friends can help you to see yourself objectively and point out things you might not notice.
5
Assess the challenges you face.^{[11]
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Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Expert Interview. 15 October 2021.} A good understanding of the reality of a situation – whether positive or negative – is necessary for an accurate outlook on life. When you’re sizing up your current circumstances, don’t shy away from noticing the bad as well as the good. It’s important to take negative situations into account so you can decide to change them or work around them.^{[12]
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6
Make a plan.^{[13]
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Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Expert Interview. 15 October 2021.} Laying out a concrete, workable plan is the surest way to make sure your goals become realities. Plans don’t have to be complex to be effective. However, a good plan should include a “when” component and a “where” component. Planning when and where you’ll do an activity makes you far more likely to follow through on your commitment.^{[14]
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- For instance, instead of telling yourself “I’ll study later tonight,” tell yourself, “I’ll study at the library at seven o’clock tonight.”
- A great strategy to make habits stick is the "if-then" planning method. Put simply, this method states that "if X happens, then Y should follow." X can be a time, place, or event. Y is the action you will take in response to it. For instance, if it's Monday at 7pm (X), you know that you should spend 2 hours at your university library (Y). Research shows that you are 2 to 3 times more likely to succeed at your goals by following this method.^{[15]
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7
Prepare for obstacles. Keep in mind that life is not a straight upward curve. It often includes many setbacks along the way. Your success or failure has a lot to do with the way you handle setbacks. People who assume they will encounter obstacles and make plans to overcome them tend to be much more successful than people who assume success will come to them easily.^{[16]
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Trustworthy Source
Harvard Business Review
Online and print journal covering topics related to business management practices
Go to source}
- It isn’t pessimistic to assume things will go wrong – it’s simply realistic. Things do, in fact, go wrong all the time, often for reasons beyond our control. Pessimism assumes that obstacles are insurmountable, while realistic optimism finds ways around them.
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Examine your expectations.^{[17]
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Expert Source

Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Expert Interview. 15 October 2021.} If your expectations are unrealistic, then this may cause you to feel disappointed sometimes. Consider whether or not your expectations for yourself are realistic, and if they are not, then consider how you might adjust them to be more realistic.
- For example, if you always expect to get A+ grades on every test you take, then you might feel incredibly disappointed if you get an A- on a test. However, this is still a great grade, so you might want to adjust your expectations to accept a wider range of grades.

Part 3

Part 3 of 3:

Beating Pessimism

1
Re-examine your beliefs. Pessimism tends to come from negative beliefs or thought patterns. When you’re feeling pessimistic, take a step back from your emotions and think about where your feelings are coming from.
- If you find that you’re holding onto self-defeating ideas or a negative self-image, remind yourself that these ideas aren’t rational and they don’t have to hold you back.
- Make sure that you are surrounding yourself with optimistic people as well. You can meet new like-minded people by searching for groups on sites like Meetup.com.
2
Use logic to fight negative thoughts. When you start having pessimistic thoughts, ask yourself, “Is this really true?” Often you’ll find that pessimism is driven by emotions that don’t have much to do with reality. Maintaining a rational mindset can help you see these thoughts for the illusions they are.^{[18]
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- For instance, if you have the pessimistic feeling that one of your coworkers doesn’t like you, instead of dwelling on the thought, ask yourself why you think that. Is there a more likely explanation? Perhaps your coworker is having a bad day, or they simply have a gruff demeanor.
3
Remember your successes. When you’re feeling pessimistic, it’s easy to see all the negative in your life and forget to look at the positive. Remind yourself of the good things you’ve achieved in the past to guide yourself back into a better state of mind.
- As much as you need to, bring to mind all the accomplishments you have achieved and all the obstacles you have already overcome in your life. Pay yourself on the back for graduating college. Give yourself a round of applause for finally detaching from your toxic best friend.
4
Avoid all-or-nothing thinking. All-or-nothing thinking can easily put you in a negative state of mind because it views any mistake, even a minor one, as a failure. In reality, no one and nothing is perfect.
- For example, all-or-nothing thinkers may view others as “either you love me or you hate me,” when, in truth, it’s entirely possible to love someone but not like all their habits or qualities.
- Identify areas of your thinking that match this framework and challenge how realistic they sound. Let go of all-or-nothing thinking by focusing on making progress instead of being perfect. Commit to improving on your mistakes while taking your successes into account, too.
- Also, be willing to let go of control sometimes and accept that life is unpredictable and uncertain.
5
Reach out for support. Feeling alone and unsupported can be a major trigger for pessimistic thoughts. If you’ve been feeling down or negative, reach out to someone else – a family member, a friend, a coworker – who can help you get back into a positive frame of mind.
- Social support is a powerful tool for boosting your hope and optimism, so don’t hesitate to ask others for help when you need it.^{[19]
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- Doing something as simple as calling a friend and saying “Hey, I’ve been feeling down lately, do you have a minute to chat?” can work wonders for your state of mind.
- If you are constantly feeling pessimistic, then consider seeing a mental health professional to help you with this.

Expert Q&A

Question

Is it good to be optimistic?

Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC
Certified Leadership & Life Coach
Christina Stathopoulos is a Certified Leadership and Life Coach and the Founder of Hear Her Roar, a coaching service for women leaders. With more than five years of experience, she specializes in leadership development, relationships, empowerment, public speaking, and work-life balance. Christina holds a BA in Chemistry and English from Mount Holyoke College. She has also received her Professional Certified Coach Credential from The International Coaching Federation and Accomplishment Coaching Certification from Accomplishment Coaching.

Christina Stathopoulos, PCC, ACCC

Certified Leadership & Life Coach

Expert Answer

Definitely! There's nothing wrong with being optimistic, as long as you don't move into the realm of magical thinking. For instance, "I believe that I can start a profitable business in the next 18 months" is optimistic thinking, while "I'm going to make a million dollars in 1 month" is magical thinking.