Quotes About Optimism

Christian optimism is not a sugary optimism, nor is it a mere human confidence that everything will turn out all right. It is an optimism that sinks its roots into an awareness of our freedom, and the sure knowledge of the power of grace. It is an optimism that leads us to make demands on ourselves, to struggle to respond at every moment to God's call.

Magic enables man to carry out with confidence his important tasks, to maintain his poise and his mental integrity in fits of anger, in the throes of hate, of unrequited love, of despair and anxiety. The function of magic is to ritualize man's optimism, to enhance his faith in the victory of hope over fear. Magic expresses the greater value for man of confidence over doubt, of steadfastness over vacillation, of optimism over pessimism.

Many of the most successful men I have known have never grown up. They have retained bubbling-over boyishness. They have relished wit, they have indulged in humor. They have not allowed ‘dignity’ to depress them into moroseness. Youthfulness of spirit is the twin brother of optimism, and optimism is the stuff of which American business success is fashioned. Resist growing up!

With despair, true optimism begins: the optimism of the man who expects nothing, who knows he has no rights and nothing coming to him, who rejoices in counting on himself alone and in acting alone for the good of all.

It was his optimism that Freud bequeathed to America and it was the optimism of our youthfulness, our freedom from the sterner, sadder tradition of Europe which enabled us to seize his gift.

What most impressed me about Cuba was the optimism.

I am an adult; deliberately naïve, dewy-eyed optimism is not the proper posture for a responsible adult, is it?

Optimism may sometimes be delusional, but pessimism is always delusional.

Optimism inspires, energizes, and brings out our best. It points the mind toward possibilities and helps us think creatively past problems.

It's an awful truth that suffering can deepen us, give a greater lustre to our colours, a richer resonance to our words. That is, if it doesn't destroy us, if it doesn't burn away the optimism and the spirit, the capacity for visions, and the respect for simple yet indispensable things.

Optimism is a kind of heart stimulant - the digitalis of failure.

My view is that at a younger age your optimism is more and you have more imagination etc. You have less bias.

Real optimism knows the difficulties but believes they can be overcome.

You know, you have to start with hope...you don't get anywhere in this country without hope. So it's a necessity. What Barack says is that people have to understand hope isn't just blind optimism. It isn't passive. It isn't just sitting there waiting for things to get better. Hope is the vision that you have to have. It's the inspiration that moves people into action...There are more people engaged in this political process in this year than we've seen in my lifetime. And it is all because of hope because people believe in the possibility of something unseen.

Optimism, positivity and faith create the foundation from which success can be built.

There is something in the American project, something in simple American oratory, something in the hope and idealism of this frustrating and contradictory nation that still makes my spirits soar and my heart leap with optimism and belief. If only they understood how to make a cup of tea.

I have a lot of optimism about new doctors because I think it's really clear that it's a lot of hard work and no guarantee of a lot of money.

You can think everything is dire, but you act as if there's possibility. I see children coming into the world as an expression of this. Sometimes, not always - it can just be somebody that wasn't on the birth control pill or didn't have access to abortion. But I usually see a wanted child as a sign of optimism, and I like that.

What is hope but a feeling of optimism, a thought that says things will improve, it won't always be bleak, there's a way to rise above the present circumstances. Hope is an internal awareness that you do not have to suffer forever, and that somehow, somewhere there is a remedy for despair that you will come upon if you can only maintain this expectancy in your heart.

But hey, what's life without a little adversity?" That had to have been the fakest attempt at optimism since my fourth grade teacher tried reasoning that we were better off without the dead kids in our class because it'd mean more turns on the playground swings for the rest of us.

Promiscuity: optimism, free enterprise, mobility--the American Dream.

Does not a misplaced optimism exist, common to all mankind, leading on to false conviction that social engagements, if dated sufficiently far ahead, will never really materialize?

I refuse to "look up." Optimism nauseates me. It is perverse. Since man's fall, his proper position in the universe has been one of misery.

Sow seeds of hope and enjoy optimism. Sow seeds of doubt and expect insecurity

I'm only trying to present as honest a portrayal of the grimness of human ambition as I can. I'd hope it's rather uplifting, actually, since I find the sort of blind optimism and empty laughter of a great deal of "contemporary culture" to be more depressing than something that admits to a potential for disappointment and a gnawing sense of existential mockery.

You would have to say his number one accomplishment has been to inspire a sense of confidence in the country... That confidence, that optimism, not only gives President Obama a political cushion, but it could have a real world economic impact.

Optimism is important. You have to be a little silly about the goals you are going to set. There is a phrase I learned in college called, 'having a healthy disregard for the impossible.' That is a really good phrase. You should try to do things that most people would not do.

Great leaders are pragmatists who can deal with difficult realities but still have the optimism and courage to act.

Optimism - the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.

We need more pessimism that the future might be a lot worse, and we need more optimism that the future might be better.

The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

I think I have more optimism than they do and I think I have a better vision for the country than [Barack and Michelle Obama] do and I think it's a nasty statement. In actuality, it doesn't pertain to me.

I believe in optimism & plenty of white paint.

Optimism is not only a false but also a pernicious doctrine, for it presents life as a desirable state and man's happiness as its aim and object. Starting from this, everyone then believes he has the most legitimate claim to happiness and enjoyment. If, as usually happens, these do not fall to his lot, he believes that he suffers an injustice, in fact that he misses the whole point of his existence.

I... allowed my memory to journey back to the days when I was a boy of ten, full of health and optimism, when my wonder at the great game of living had yet to give way to disillusionment at its shabbiness.

It's such an act of optimism to get through a day and enjoy it and laugh and do all that without thinking about death. What spirit human beings have!

Placebos are like the lollipop of optimism, but we can do much better by dealing directly with the mind... And it works!

[Grew up in Hawaii] that gave [Barack Obama] a kind of optimism, an ability to see things, you know, and frankly, an ability to trust, you know, in his fellow, you know, white countrymen in a way that I, for instance, you know, and the vast majority of black people I know never really could.

The essence of optimism is that it takes no account of the present, but it is a source of inspiration, of vitality and hope where others have resigned; it enables a man to hold his head high, to claim the future for himself and not to abandon it to his enemy.

Pessimism is a losing strategy. Leadership demands both confidence and optimism in abundance.

If we have optimism without empathy then it doesn't matter how much we master the secrets of science. We're not really solving problems, we're just working on puzzles.

Optimism is the true moral courage

Optimism means better than reality; pessimism means worse than reality. I'm a realist.

In every difficult situation there is a door to opportunity for which optimism is the only key.

Buy not on optimism, but on arithmetic.

In my forties, my optimism was boundless. I had really good health and tremendous success which allowed me to do anything I wanted.

The dreams of the 1960s began to disappear in the 1970s. The economy collapsed, and so did the optimism of the Metabolists.

It struck me that the chief obstacle to marital contentment was this perpetual gulf between the well-founded, commendable pessimism of women and the sheer dumb animal optimism of men, the latter a force more than any other responsible for the lamentable state of the world.