John Pistone

For the longest time, I have tried to understand and label my personality trait.  It wasn’t until the past few years that my understanding of what makes me tick has become slightly clearer.  I have been called negative or skeptical, mainly because I ask a lot of questions.  But I don’t feel negative.  In fact, I believe that I am optimistic because I truly do expect good things to happen to me.  My favorite saying is, “Prepare for the worst and pray for the best”.  In my experience, the worst rarely happens, but when it does, I have a plan in place to mitigate the negative results. 

After researching the topic, I found that a skeptic is someone who needs to ask questions, collect evidence, and see proof before they accept something as true.  Optimism can be defined as a stable personality trait related to positive expectations regarding future events. Seeing that both definitions apply to me, I call myself a skeptical optimist.  I was so proud of myself for coining this catchy phrase to describe my personality trait until I searched the Internet.  Apparently, there is nothing new under the sun, and I share this personality trait with a large portion of the population.  Just because skeptical optimism is not a new idea does not prevent me from writing about and analyzing the burning questions of the day using this approach. 

We live in a very polarized society.  Across our country and the world, many take strong positions on the dominant issues of the day and ridicule others who may have a different view.  It is my belief that we should all take time to regularly read and watch news sources that differ from our basic views, in addition to those that confirm our views.  As one publisher noted, “We must all take responsibility to find news sources that are optimistically skeptical.  We should always question the sources for stories and statistics, data and facts that are cited in them”.  In doing so, we can balance our thinking and help us make better decisions as we move through this continuum, we call life.  If we are ever able to reverse the polarization afflicting our society, we must engage in civil discourse with each other.  This is my commitment moving forward.