A dear friend received bad health news. He can learn to manage his health challenges, but he will never return to his previous great health. Now that he has a diagnosis, he’s getting both the medication and various therapies to support his journey to becoming okay.
However, some members of his family think that “being okay” means “returning to his previous robust lifestyle.” That’s not going to happen. Ever.
When my friend hears, “Things will be okay,” he decided that meant, “I will live and learn to thrive.” (Those were his exact words.)
When some of his family members hear, “Things will be okay,” they are sure that means, “You’ll get back to your normal self.”
I wish he had something as “simple” as a broken leg. Most likely, he would heal and be back to his previously normal self.
With his diagnosis, he will never be “back.” He’s okay with this—some of his family is a little stuck. I suspect that’s because they think they need to be cheerleaders, always optimistic.
Optimism vs. Optimistic Realism
The image at the left is my continuum of pessimism to optimism, with the realistic possibilities closer to the middle.
While I am optimistic, I learned over the years that unrealistic optimism does not help us decide what to do next. Too often, unrealistic optimism—especially the cheerleading kind of optimism—hurts our ability to adapt. Instead, I’m a fan of realistic optimism.
Sometimes, it doesn’t matter that we are unrealistically optimistic. Long ago, on a family vacation, the summer weather was cold and wet. We had to buy rainjackets—not what we expected. Then, we started to play a game—who could see a little tiny bit of sun or clearing on the horizon? I think I tied with my dad. My mom and sister laughed at the two of us.
That was an example of using humor to manage our way out of a challenging situation. But our vacation wasn’t life-changing, except for how we realized how each of us coped with dashed expectations. (We all found ways to laugh through it.)
There’s a difference between undesired change and life-challenging change. Our vacation was undesired change. My friend is in a life-challenging situation.
Undesired Temporary Change vs. Life-Challenging Change
As soon as we have any kind of undesired change, we need to find our adaptability and resilience. For me, the most important step is to see my reality.
Even if we choose not to, we can often go “back” for any kind of temporary change. But life-challenging is permanent. That’s when we must acknowledge that our lives are different—and we’re not going back. There is no path to “back.” Only then can we start to experiment to find our adaptability and resilience.
And that’s why my friend’s attitude of realistic optimism is more effective than his family’s cheerleading optimism.
Will my friend need some cheerleading as he progresses forward, to some sense of normalcy? Maybe. Some people like that kind of cheerleading as they work on their emotional health. But that unrealistic optimism will not ever change his physical health.
His family needs to learn about realistic optimism and how that can help everyone.
How Realistic Optimism Helps People Become Okay
When the event or diagnosis is a life-challenging change, it’s fine to be realistically pessimistic. I prefer not to fall into the depths of despair, but sometimes, I do.
However, we can use realistic optimism to become okay, even when our lives had totally changed, when we will never be the same. We can be okay again, even if we won’t go back to where we were
My friend’s attitude will help him become okay. He is searching for his personal meaning right now, but he will live and thrive.
And once his family realizes that he will never return to the physical person he was before, they might also be okay.
They will all learn to understand what it now means to be okay.
That’s the question this week: What meaning do you make when you hear “things will be okay?”