Optimism: What does it mean? To me, optimism is a mental state that someone must reach in order to enjoy life and be a better person in the end. You have to be able to see the bright side in every situation even when said bright side may be difficult to distinguish. For example; if you lost in a sporting event or competition, it may just be a reminder that you need to work harder and improve your abilities if you truly want to be successful at what you do. Here are two quotes that I feel best represent Optimism:
“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” Winston Churchill
“The optimist sees the rose and not its thorns; the pessimist stares at the thorns, oblivious to the rose” Kahlil Gibran
In my opinion, the first quote talks about pessimism and how the pessimist has trouble solving his achieving his goals because whenever he comes across a problem he will look for reasons or excuses as to why he should just give up. This makes it difficult for a person like this to achieve their goals because they have that mindset that they will not be able to accomplish something they attempt, so instead they choose to tear down other people's beliefs and goals. On the other hand, the second quote really describes a truly optimistic person. An optimist can always look at the bright side of every situation and figure out that their problem is not as bad as they think it is. When you have reached a point where no matter what difficulties or roadblocks get in your way, and you still keep your head up, that is when you've truly succeeded as a optimistic person.
Some examples of novels that I've read where this sort of optimism or pessimism is being shown are in The Hunger Games series, The Harry Potter series, and the Pursuit of Happyness. In the Pursuit of Hayppyness, Chris Gardner shows a will to succeed that only an optimistic person has, overcoming rape, an abusive father, an imprisoned mother, and living on the streets in San Francisco to becoming a multimillionaire. While the Hunger Games and the Harry Potter series are fictional, their protagonists set a good lesson on what you can achieve with the will to succeed.
Make sure you create and complete the WORKS CITED page as well as part of part one. The quotations you have selected are really saying very similar things about your theme. Make sure that you are going to be able to speak about the two sides as being unique to one another. Certainly the most obvious two sides of this topic is going to be optimism and pessimism, the sides you have selected are very subtle - and therefore may be quite challenging to keep apart as you go through the rest of the project. Try to list the sources as they fit with each quotation.
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