Mr. Achievement - Stanley F. Bronstein - Personal Development BlogPersonal Development Blog of the Founder of the Achievement IQ Movement and Creator of the Laws of Positioning

Law #68

Position Yourself To Be Optimistic

Life is too short to spend your precious time trying to convince a person who wants to live in gloom and doom otherwise. Give lifting that person your best shot, but don’t hang around long enough for his or her bad attitude to pull you down. Instead, surround yourself with optimistic people. (Zig Ziglar)

Some Definitions

Life - The general or universal condition of human existence. A particular aspect of existence. the animate existence or period of animate existence of an individual.

Short - Brief in duration; not extensive in time. Below the standard in extent, quantity, duration, etc.. Being below a necessary or desired level; lacking.

Spend - To pay out, disburse, or expend; dispose of (money, wealth, resources, etc.). To use up, consume, or exhaust.

Precious - Of high price or great value; very valuable or costly. Highly esteemed for some spiritual, nonmaterial, or moral quality.

Time - A limited period or interval, as between two successive events. Duration regarded as belonging to the present life as distinct from the life to come or from eternity; finite duration. A prescribed or allotted period.

Convince - To move by argument or evidence to belief, agreement, consent, or a course of action. To persuade; cajole.

Person - A human being as distinguished from an animal or a thing. An individual human being, esp. with reference to his or her social relationships and behavioral patterns as conditioned by the culture.

Live - To continue in existence, operation, memory, etc.. To have life, as an organism; be alive; be capable of vital functions. To experience or enjoy life to the full.

Gloom - A state of melancholy or depression; low spirits. A despondent or depressed look or expression.

Doom - Fate or destiny, esp. adverse fate; unavoidable ill fortune.

Lift / Lifting - To direct or carry from a lower to a higher position; raise. To raise in condition, rank, or esteem.

Best Shot - an attempt or try of the highest quality, excellence or standing. The most advantageous, suitable, or desirable attempt or try.

Hang Around - To spend time in a certain place or in certain company. To linger about.

Long Enough - A duration adequate for the want or need. A duration in a quantity or degree that answers a purpose or satisfies a need or desire; sufficiently.

Bad Attitude - A negative manner, disposition, feeling or position with regard to a person or thing. A negative tendency or orientation, especially of the mind.

Pull You Down - To draw or tug at with force from a higher position to a lower one, especially of the mind or of an attitude.

Surround - To enclose on all sides; encompass.

Optimistic - Disposed to take a favorable view of events or conditions and to expect the most favorable outcome.

Pessimistic - A attitude of one who habitually sees or anticipates the worst or is disposed to be gloomy.

Source: Dictionary.com

What Does This Quote Suggest?

To me it suggests that we need to hang around with optimistic people. Life is simply too short to spend all of our time trying to lift someone out of their doldrums and to try to convince them that life is not all doom and gloom.

HOWEVER, it does suggest that we should try to lift them up and help them to be more optimistic. In other words, we should give it our best shot; we should try to help them out. BUT, if their bad attitude starts to pull us down, then it means we’re sticking around them too long and too much.

After all, just as hanging around an optimistic person can pick someone else up, hanging around a pessimistic person too long can bring someone else down.

Then it gives the really best piece of advice possible:

Hang around optimistic people. After all, you become just like those you spend the most time with.

If you hang around optimistic people, you will become optimistic.

Become The Type Of Person You Would Want To Hang Around

What type of person do you want to hang around?

Optimistic, bright, positive minded people; or

Pessimistic, dull, negative minded people.

Is there really any choice?

Okay, let’s assume you want to hang around positive people.  Are you in a position to attract that type of person into your life?

Think about it, if you were somebody who was positive, would you want to hang around someone who is negative.  Probably not.  So I ask you, are you positive or negative?

If you are positive, wonderful.  If you are negative, you need to work on yourself.

Actually, even if you’re positive, we all can use a little bit of work.

BUT, the bottom line is that if you want to hang around positive people and to attract positive people into your life, then you are going to need to be positive (even if it’s a little painful sometimes - grin).

Getting Rid Of Negative People In Our Lives

Do you have any negative people in your life?  In my second book, Achievement IQ:  Find Purpose In Your CAREER & Achieve Massive Success, I coined a phrase:  toxaholics.

Toxaholics are people who continuously spew toxic venom all over us as we go through life.  If you have toxaholics around you, you need to recognize who and what they are and you need to get rid of them.

It really is that simple.  Negative people need to go.  If you are negative, then the negative aspects of you need to go.

Anything negative needs to go.

After all, Optimism is about the positive.  The positive will ALWAYS prevail, IF we let it and IF we work at it.

IF you want to be successful, you need to work at it.