Uticopa Blog

All my life I've been a pessimist.  At least, that's what everybody tells me, so it must be true, mustn't it ?  I was perplexed, therefore, to read in ‘The Times' that psychologists are at last coming round to the view that ‘constructive negativism' can be quite a good thing. Is this what I and many other people have ? 

It all started with my paternal grandmother, who hailed originally from Eastern Europe. Her family, from the icy wastes of Lithuania, were long familiar with what we deem to be pessimism. It seems that those of us who descend from this part of the world are particularly prone to the syndrome, and now a genetic link has apparently been found. Of course, we all knew that really, deep down. There are so many of us who can recall our Russian/Polish grandmothers sitting with black scarves around their heads, despondent heads resting on a hand, giving that all pervasive and non-explanatory ‘oy' at all the injustices in life. 

What a surprise, then, to discover that eminent researchers in the U.S. have been studying the syndrome and have come up with some surprising conclusions.  Not only have they discovered a genetic link but also that to have a constructive negativism mindset is a good thing after all. How can this be, I hear you say ?  We have long been conditioned, particularly by the Americans, to believe that optimism is everything. We must never be sad, depressed or despondent. We must instantly ignore the fact that there may have been a death in the family, for example, but jump up, smile, and get on with life. 

Those of us who, like me, must really have constructive negativism know only too well how to use it to good effect. Research, apparently, has now proven that people with this newly-named syndrome actually do rather well in life. Optimists go through life happy and joyful, but are shocked when unforeseen things suddenly go wrong. They are often unable to work out what to do. Negativists, on the other hand, rely on the premise that at all times we need to work out what is the base-line (the worst that can possibly happen), and then formulate a strategy should it actually come to pass.  They are usually the first to react when disasters happen in life (and they usually do, to all of us, at some time), because of course they have already foreseen it and worked out a plan. 

The crucial distinction here, though, is the difference between continual pessimism and worry (which can affect your mental health, if taken to extremes, and can even contribute to such tragedies as cancer) and the much-better constructive negativism.

So, the moral of all this for people like me is:  make sure you avoid the ‘oy' syndrome of grandmothers like mine (as this was surely the bad, pessimistic approach), and try to cultivate a constructive negativism mindset. You never know, it might just change your life when the next life-changing disaster occurs!

A happy 2009 to you all (but don't forget to work out what your particular ‘base-line' is and develop a plan to deal with it!).