Zeno's Bar & Grill

All those pictures of falling Olympic skaters in the papers have had me thinking about falling, both literally and metaphorically. First of all, I have to say, I think it’s a bit cruel of the papers to publish those pics. Skaters are a pretty high strung bunch, and it must stress them out even more to see the most embarrassing and unflattering shots plastered across the front pages day after day.

How skaters and other athletes handle their stress carries lessons that can help us all to be more optimistic and less depressed, believe it or not. This is described in a fantastic book that I want to reread again soon: Learned Optimism, by Martin E.P. Seligman, Ph.D.
In it, he draws on all kinds of research to show how thinking positively can make people feel better and lead to greater success than pessimism. It sounds flaky, but is backed up by a lot of convincing data.

One of his examples is professional athletes. He describes studies that actually tabulated the “explanatory” quotes from athletes in the news and found that the more positive their explanations (the less hard they were on themselves when they fumbled) the better they did overall. Isn’t that cool? So, when I read this morning in the NYT, that Sasha Cohen was saying things like, “Ultimately it’s four minutes from my life”, and other positive explanations for her less-than-golden performance at the Olympics I thought, You Go Girl!

The book describes three types of thinking that get people down. The main pitfalls are telling oneself that a bad event or screw-up is Permanent (will go on forever), Pervasive (affects all aspects of life) and/or Personal (all your fault, rather than due to anything external). We can all benefit from learning how to reprogram this kind of thinking. Even if you don’t think you’re a pessimist, you might be—I was surprised by my tendencies that direction when I read the book the first time.

So, the next time you get a traffic ticket (like I did last week), or forget to pack your child’s lunch in their backpack on the day of the big field trip…or whatever it is that bums you out, don’t automatically jump to “It’s me, all me, and I’ll never change. I’m a loser, etc”. Those negative thoughts will only keep you on the floor (or ice rink, as the case may be).

In the words of Dougie MacLean, who I saw in concert last month…”You can fall, but you must not lie down.” He had the whole audience singing along at his show, and I have been singing it ever since.

--Melanie