
I thought I’d piggyback on my previous post (Naivety) so that I could bring some positivity back to the game. When I talked about naivety, I wasn’t expressing my beliefs (I don’t walk around angry) – I was simply pondering the word, it’s meaning, and what the word means to me.
That being said, it went a wee bit against my grain, which is normally optimistic. I actually think that naivety and optimism may have a few things in common, so this was the perfect “O” word for tonight.
Naivety appears to be the belief that people or things are good (or safe) – because the naïve individual is not aware that anything contrary to “good” exists. They lack experience.
Optimism, on the other hand, may be it’s more experienced counterpart. An optimist knows that bad exists, but he or she still believes that everything is (or will be) good. They believe this ‘in spite’ of the knowledge that bad things (or people) exist – not because they don’t have a clue. That’s where discernment comes in.
The definitions I found for optimism are “hopefulness and confidence about the future or the successful outcome of something,” and “the tendency to be hopeful and to emphasize or think of the good part in a situation rather than the bad part.”
So… it’s pretty clear that optimism is not naivety. It’s about being deliberate. I’m pretty sure no one ‘chooses’ to be naïve – it’s like something we’re born with… something that escapes us as we learn about the world. But optimism appears to be a choice.
Anyway, I did an illustration for my thoughts on Optimism and I think it’s… OK. (I wish I could be more optimistic about it!) It’s not what I saw in my head but it will have to do. Perhaps if the girl were smiling it might be more convincing. Haha!
Speaking of things not looking like what we imagined… I went to my first painting class last night. Don’t ask me how, but I ended up with a canvas that was covered in lime green. Sopping wet with way too much paint. Every time I painted something I didn’t like I just brushed over the whole canvas and blended the colors together. So I painted A LOT.
I realized, while in bed, that what happened was the result of using a large brush. Of course you can’t paint details with a big brush… what was I thinking?! I’m used to my keyboard and mouse… not brushes! I’ve been… well… very naïve when it comes to painting! Now I know that bad painting exists (haha!), so I’m looking forward to trying again next week.
I’m making my way through the Alphabet Game a lot quicker than I’d intended because it’s giving me time to think before I go back to telling stories. I need to ponder more ideas on that end… and I’ll talk about it more when I write about the “P” word… (SPOILER ALERT!!)
………… Plot.
That’s about all for now. Thank you for reading or viewing, I hope you enjoyed something here!
I’ll see you soon!