FAREWELL

022 - The Coach Up: Instead of Toxic Positivity, Try Tragic Optimism

Mar 18, 2024

Explore the concept of tragic optimism as a balanced mindset, finding the middle ground between toxic positivity and hopelessness. Embrace life's challenges while maintaining hope and positivity. Learn how to navigate personal growth, relationship dynamics, and societal challenges with a mindset of tragic optimism.

10:08

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Episode guests

Brad

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Quick takeaways

Tragic optimism promotes a balanced mindset embracing hope and realism amidst life's challenges.

Radical acceptance complements tragic optimism by encouraging proactive efforts for improvement despite difficulties.

Deep dives

Tragic Optimism: Balancing Realism and Hope

Tragic optimism, as discussed in the podcast, emphasizes the importance of maintaining a hopeful yet realistic mindset in the face of life's challenges. It originated from Victor Frankel's concept, highlighting that humans inevitably face tragedy, pain, and impermanence. Unlike toxic positivity or nihilism, tragic optimism allows individuals to acknowledge the hardships while retaining a positive outlook. By embracing both tragic and optimistic perspectives simultaneously, individuals can navigate difficulties without succumbing to extremes, enabling them to approach life with resilience and a full emotional experience.

Maintaining Hope in the Face of Tragic Realities

03:12

The Concept of Tragic Optimism

02:05

Introduction

3min

Navigating Toxic Positivity, Tragic Optimism, and Radical Acceptance

2min

Embracing Tragic Optimism Over Toxic Positivity

3min

Embracing Tragic Optimism and Accepting Life's Challenges

2min

The world can be pretty wonderful. It can also be pretty terrible. So we need a mindset that works for both of these circumstances. Unfortunately, these days, we often live on the extremes. On the one end of the spectrum, there's toxic positivity, which means remaining upbeat in the face of something that's really difficult, or hard, or sad, and needs to be experienced and processed as such. On the other , there's straight up hopelessness or nihilism, a sense that everything is so bad, we might as well just give up. We need something in between, a Goldilocks fit that accounts for difficulty but still allows for hope. That is where tragic optimism comes in. Brad writes extensively about this in his book, Master of Change. So today he joins the podcast to talk us through it.

To learn more about tragic optimism, and other tools to help you to live in an ever-changing world, buy Brad's book, Master of Change.

If you are enjoying FAREWELL, the best way you can support us so that we can keep doing what we're doing is to leave a review or share the show with a friend. Thanks!

Got a question, feedback, or ideas for the show? Email clay.growtheq@gmail.com or leave a voicemail at (646) 893-9503

Find Brad, Steve, and Clay on Instagram: @bradstulberg, @stevemagness, and @clayskipper

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FAREWELL

022 - The Coach Up: Instead of Toxic Positivity, Try Tragic Optimism

Episode guests

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Deep dives

Tragic Optimism: Balancing Realism and Hope

Actionable Resilience and Acceptance

Maintaining Hope in the Face of Tragic Realities

The Concept of Tragic Optimism

Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts