Loss of vital optimism

On vacations, I always bring a few good books to read. One year, I read Mid-course correction, by Gordon MacDonald. Feeling I had made a complete landing in what some call middle age, it seemed just the right book. It didn’t help that I read it by the lazy river at Six Flags New England while my then fourteen year old (the youngest of four) was pleading with me to join him and his brothers as they willingly subjected themselves to the terror of metal apparatuses moving at unimaginable speeds in every conceivable direction. I use to enjoy those rides. What happened? Why did I prefer a book by the lazy river to having my body jolted and twisted? Was I finally conquered by middle age? It scared me to think about it but I stuck with the book. 

The title of the introduction grabbed my attention: “Vital optimism”. The author borrowed the phrase from military historian John Keegan. According to Keegan, in a particular battle of World War I, the British lost 70,000 troops and suffered an unthinkable number of wounded. With that loss, the British also lost a mood of vital optimism that had prevailed for almost a century. Many believe that British life has never fully recovered.  

“Think about it!” wrote MacDonald, “One terrible battle with catastrophic losses, and the cultural momentum (centuries in the making) of a great nation is arrested, dissipated. I’m drawn by Keegan’s term vital optimism. It describes a quality of spirit possessed by a community or a person where there is a persuasion that the best is yet to be. Whatever the past, the future will be better.”            

After reading the introduction, I put the book down and thought about loss of vital optimism. Clearly, this could be a danger of mid-life. Early childhood, youth and young adult life are usually full of optimism. With time, however, optimism fades. I’ve seen it happen in my life and in others. “Ah yes,” I tell myself, “I am more seasoned; more mature; more restrained in my judgment.” But how far is it to the next step? How does maturity give way to melancholy? When does restraint become a prevailing mood of disincentive? And then there are those who move from a sense of defeat and resignation to cynicism and bitterness?            

           

I thought of the biblical warning, “See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many” (Hebrews 12:15). Pessimism and, even worse, bitterness are infectious and defiling. But how does this loss of vital optimism conquer us?

 

Somewhere along the way, many allow the setbacks and discouragements of life to define their spirit. They accept a spirit of disincentive–vacillating between mild resignation and deep despair. Some enter this disposition because of a single catastrophic loss. They lose their joy and their reason for life and hope. But how can we avoid or overcome this cycle of setbacks, discouragement and despair?

My vacation reading challenged me with some answers but it didn’t cut deeply enough. If you struggle with loss of vital optimism, I recommend another book: Radical Gratitude: Discovering joy through everyday thankfulness (Zondervan). I discovered this book while browsing titles in a local bookstore. The author, Ellen Vaughn, has probed the depths of gratitude and cut a clear path to restored joy. As I paged through her book, an opening quote to one chapter caused me to sit down in a near-by chair. 

Thoughts about vital optimism were still with me when I encountered this quote: “It’s a sign of mediocrity when you demonstrate gratitude with moderation.” “Yes,” I thought, “there must be a connection between loss of optimism and a decreased practice of gratitude!”           

This is the way back! At the risk of oversimplification, I believe a renewed discipline of gratitude will help you shake the spirit of discouragement. Vaughn suggests that, “Few of us want to cozy up to the fact that most often God changes us in the process of ordinary day-to-day dependence on him.”  

          

We express this dependence when we “engage in the perpetual dialogue of gratitude.” Vaughn invites her readers to a life of radical gratitude as a means to “turn the tide, rather than follow along on the lazy downward spiral of negativity.” “What I have found,” she wrote, “is that the rhythm of divine renewal beats in the pulse of a purposefully grateful heart.” Nothing short of divine renewal will lift despondent people out of their despair. But let us be assured that there is a deep connection between divine renewal and a thankful heart.  

What does Scripture teach? “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (I Thessalonians 5:18). Spirit-filled people are “always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 5:18-20).

The words all, always and everything, justify Vaugn’s title, “Radical Gratitude.” She captures this tone when she recommends that, “Cultivating a grateful heart is not just an add-on nicety, a civil tip of the hat to God as we steamroll through our day. A posture of purposeful, perpetual thanks to God is absolutely central to Christian character.” If you want to leave the land of despair and restore vital optimism, Radical Gratitude by Ellen Vaughn offers a great road map.  

Steve Cornell