Can you learn to be more optimistic?

Optimism has a slightly bad reputation among sensible people. It sounds like refusing to read the weather forecast. But the version psychologists talk about is less about expecting sunshine and more about how you explain the rain.

Explanatory style

The idea, associated with the psychologist Martin Seligman and his book Learned Optimism, is that people have a habitual way of explaining why things happen to them. When something goes wrong, the explanation tends to vary along three lines:

• Permanent or temporary? "I always mess up interviews" versus "that interview went badly".
• Pervasive or specific? "I'm useless at everything" versus "I'm rusty at this particular thing".
• Personal or circumstantial? "It's entirely my fault" versus "I played a part, and so did the timing and the traffic".

A more pessimistic style leans towards the first of each pair; a more optimistic one leans towards the second. Most of us mix both, depending on the day and the subject.

Realistic, not rosy

The useful kind of optimism is not denial. If you missed the train because you left late, the honest explanation includes leaving late. Realistic optimism keeps the facts and changes the scale: this happened, it is about this situation, and the next attempt is a fresh one. It is the difference between "I'm always late" and "I left late today, so tomorrow I'll leave ten minutes earlier".

What practising looks like

Practice here is mostly catching your explanations and checking them. Programmes built on this work, such as the Penn Resilience Program at the University of Pennsylvania, teach people to spot the beliefs behind their reactions, test whether they are accurate, and consider other interpretations. You can borrow that structure informally:

1. Notice the setback. Something specific: the rejected application, the flat cake, the race that went badly.
2. Write down your first explanation, word for word. You may be surprised how sweeping it is.
3. Check it against the three lines. Is it as permanent, as pervasive and as personal as it sounds?
4. Write a more accurate version. Not a cheerful one; an accurate one.
5. Pick one next step that the accurate version allows.

Done on paper a few times, this becomes quicker, and eventually it starts happening in your head.

Look at good days too

Explanatory style works the other way round as well. People who explain setbacks as permanent often explain successes as flukes: "I got lucky." When something goes well, try giving yourself proportionate credit. "I prepared properly" is as valid as "the questions were easy".

Small habits that help

• Talk to yourself as you would to a friend. Most of us would never tell a friend they are hopeless at everything.
• Separate one event from the whole picture. A bad week at work does not make it a bad year.
• Keep a short record of things that went right. Memory has a way of keeping the misses and losing the good bits.
• Spend time with people who are realistic and warm. Outlook rubs off.

How we talk to ourselves in general is a bigger subject, which we look at in changing your self-talk.