A regular reader and good friend sent me a link to a TED talk entitled “The Future Will Be Shaped by Optimists”. The talk is given by Kevin Kelly (July 2021) and is about 10 minutes long. I have embedded the video at the bottom of this blog for you to view.
In it, Kevin defines optimism as believing in what is possible. Where in spite of the messiness of life, those that came before us gave us the many things we enjoy today. For every new invention needed someone to believe it was possible before they created it. Optimists are needed to create our future as a society. Bad things happen quickly and often give pessimists their “fire”. Good things take much longer to appear. And then cautioning us that solutions of the past then create new problems. And the cycle repeats itself.
What made an impression on me, is that the same could be said of our individual lives. We create our own future once we believe in what is possible and then work towards it. Problems and disappointments challenge us along the way. Where optimism uses problems to help reveal possible solutions and then working each day to craft their solutions. Using the compounding of our efforts to propel us into personal growth and development.
Always choosing optimism can lead to good things over time. Thanks to Kevin for taking the time to explain to us how this works. Hope you enjoy this video as much as my friend and I did.