For Your Health’s Sake – Keep Your Glass Half Full

When you’ve been dealt a bitter blow, the temptation is very often to wallow a little.

We tend to feel we deserve a period of negative self-reflection, and it can actually feel strangely and bizarrely enjoyable, because a melancholic state of mind is strangely enticing and, once you’re in that frame, it’s incredibly immersive.

It’s like the shame of eating a whole tub of ice-cream, or staying in your pyjamas all day long because you can’t raise the energy to engage with the world. You know what you’re doing is a little lazy, extremely self-indulgent and you’re not especially proud, but the sensation, in some perverted way, feels rewarding, even though it’s non-constructive activity you’re involving yourself with.

In the same way, when we are alone after a separation – epoitherPP newly single and adjusting to the solitude or when we’ve been alone for a while and are considering opportunities we may have missed – it’s always tempting to sit back and spend a day or two, sometimes even a week, considering that we are simply unlucky, or that destiny had this planned for us. It’s so easy to believe that this fate has been pre-written for us that we often fall into the trap of inertia, unable to bring ourselves back to earth in order to fight this catatonic sense of hard luck.

The worst thing is – it really doesn’t have to be this way – and what’s more, research is suggesting that it could be bad for your health!

New research detailed in The Daily Mail today highlights that this a ‘half glass empty’ attitude could actually harm – or at least minimize the effectiveness of – our immune systems, making us more vulnerable to viral infections and illness. When tracking over a hundred students, Professor Suzanne Segerstrom of the University of Kentucky said: ‘

When people were feeling more optimistic, they also had rather stronger responses to an immune challenge.’ ‘

‘I think that when people are feeling optimistic about a specific, important challenge they are facing, they may be less vulnerable to certain health problems, like viral infections.’

This highlights for me that the cynics are wrong. Though pessimism can be a great source of humour and whilst the ability to self-deprecate effectively is a massively attractive character trait, it is proven that to hold that state of mind permanently can be unhealthy and largely detrimental to personal progress – be it in the world of work, or in your personal life.

People are attracted to doers and achievers. That’s not to say that the ability to self-reflect and think deeply aren’t necessary in life – they are just as important as ever. But the key here is to avoid the snare of self-doubt and to step over every over-critical landmine in your mind, focusing on the positives and staying out of pessimism’s way. Not only for the good of your state of mind – but also for your health!