The problem with pessimism

From Price Pritchett's book Hard Optimism, why it's better to be an optimist instead of a pessimist:

• Nine out of ten people say they're more productive when they're around positive people.
• Quoting David Landes of Harvard: "In this world the optimists have it, not because they are always right but because they are positive. Even when wrong, they are positive, and this is the way of achievement, correction, improvement, and success...pessimism can only offer the empty consolidation of being right."
• Negative thinking "orients us toward what we don't want, while obscuring the good that's within our reach." As Thoreau said, "We are always paid for our suspicion by finding what we suspect."

Strategies for becoming an optimist:

• Realize that attitudes are more important than facts.
• Focus on what you want to expand. What you focus on, you get more of.
• Focus on what you can do, not on what you cannot do.
• Think of possibilities instead of limitations.
  
• Act the way you want to feel. "Positive doing" works faster than "positive thinking."