#Case of tragic optimism professional

Tragic optimism as a buffer against COVID-19 suffering and the psychometric properties of a brief version of the Life Attitudes Scale. Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 9(1), 23-31. Development of the Vicarious Resilience Scale (VRS): A measure of positive effects of working with trauma survivors. Killian, K.D., Hernandez, P., Engstrom, D., & Gangsei, D. Olatunji (Ed.), The Cambridge handbook of anxiety and related disorders (pp. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 5(5).

Form tribulations to appreciation: experiencing adversity in the past predicts greater savoring in the present. In fact, if one learns to flex one’s gratitude muscles, experiencing adversity can enhance appreciation for life’s simple pleasures (Croft, Dunn, & Quoidbach, 2014).Ĭroft, A., Dunn, E.W., & Quoidbach, J. To get and stay clean and sober in the face of pain, guilt, and death means to say yes to life in spite of all of these things. That comes from processing traumatic events by wrestling with them and actively searching for meaning from what we've been confronted with. What does tragic optimism mean Tragic optimism means that one is, and remains, optimistic in spite of the tragic triad: 1. But simply surviving a trauma doesn’t guarantee growth. Studies of post-traumatic growth (PTG), and vicarious resilience (Killian et al., 2017) have found that we can grow through primary and secondary traumatic events, leading to increased appreciation of one’s life and increased compassion, purpose, and altruism. It may also cause one to miss out on an opportunity for growth (Kaufman, 2021).

#Case of tragic optimism professional

In my professional and clinical roles, I don’t tell clients, supervisees, or friends to simply “stay positive” because it rings hollow during a global crisis and sounds like a ducking of reality. Psychological researchers refer to such a stance as toxic optimism, and it’s just not very helpful. A Pollyanna-ish stance of “everything’s coming up roses” and rushing to all places normal-when 1 in 500 Americans have died of COVID-is tone deaf and, frankly, out of touch. As Buddhists remind us, being human means experiencing discomfort, disappointment, and pain human existence involves suffering. Over the last few years, a significant body of research has been carried out about the effectiveness of optimism as a psychological phenomenon, leading to various theoretical formulations of the same concept, understood as disposition, attributional style, cognitive bias, or shared illusion.