I am an optimist, my cup runneth over!  My husband would accuse me of being recklessly optimistic, but then he's a pessimist.  Most of the time I do believe that things will work out in the end.  That's not to say that I don't ever worry, I do and plenty.  But I don't run around thinking the sky is falling!  My husband is the chicken little in our house and let's face it you only need one.

It's all my mother's doing.  When we were little and would see an ambulance pass by, she would say ' Oh goodie, someone's having a baby!'  My mother instilled joyfulness in us and not just to be joyful but to seek it out.  My parents gave us the tools to turn lemons into lemonade--confidence, hope and faith.

My parents praised our efforts as well as our successes.  They told us how proud they were of us and made sure we were in earshot when they bragged on us to others.  But by far the most esteem building act they did for us was to let us pick ourselves up when we fell down.  By allowing us the experience of  mistakes and poor choices, they provided the opportunity to learn to sort it out and the knowledge and pride that we could fix it ourselves. This usually followed with an ice cream cone.  'Dust yourself off and get back on that horse.'

My parents placed hope in our hearts by being trustworthy.  Whatever they said they were going to do, they did it.  They were and still are people you can trust and count on.  Hope, after all, is the anticipation of good things.  If time after time your hope is met with disappointment, you quickly lose hope.  Again, things weren't always fair or turned out the way we would have liked but when this happened my mother would explain things simply and always find the good to come out of it. This also usually followed with an ice cream cone.  'Every cloud has a silver lining.' 

Faith, put simply, is the belief in something we cannot see.  My parents began growing our faith with the little things, Santa, the Eater Bunny and the Tooth Fairy.  Notice how I use capital letters to indicate proper nouns, I still believe, that's how good a job my parents did!  By helping us to believe in these things and providing proof of their existence ( half eaten cookies and milk, hidden eggs and a quarter under our pillows) we were able to believe whole heartedly even though we had never seen with our own eyes a red suit, fuzzy tail or fairy dust.  The nurturing of this belief in the unseen then prepared our hearts for the belief in the bigger things later in life like justice, love and God.  I personally think that people who believe in a higher power have a better chance at an optimistic life.  If you're already practiced in faith, it is easier to believe that things will work out for the best even if you have no proof for it.  'Faith is as a mustard seed.'

Through self reliance, constancy and belief, my parents raised sunny dispostioned kids and  I hope to follow in their footsteps in raising my two sons.  I grin as I whisper a prayer when my youngest son hears the sirens of an ambulance and says 'Mom, someone's having a baby!' and thank God for the blessing that my cup runneth over.

Tags: happy, optimistic, raising kids

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