Optimism entails two different aspects. The first aspect encompasses the attitude or mindset that arises due to hopefulness and confidence about the future. So often this word is associated with happiness, when in actuality it relates more to the word joy. Joy exists regardless of the circumstance, while happiness comes forth only as the transient result of prosperity, pleasure, knowledge, wealth, popularity, etc. The chasing of these accomplishments creates temporary fulfillment followed by the desire for more. More money, more knowledge, more friends, more status, more more more. Yet, when a life that has chased happiness comes towards its end, the inevitability of death unmasks itself and the toil of life, the valleys, the …show more content…
The wise man faces the same fate as the fool, the beggar as the rich man, the somebody as the nobody. So if optimism derives from hopefulness and confidence about the future, this life of temporary fulfillment could never have held true optimism. A person, may have faced each mountain with courage, walked every valley with dignity, looked for the good, overcome the bad, but if they did this all for themselves, in their own will, for timely purpose, ignoring the beckoning of eternity on their heart, they still have no true hope or confidence in their future.
That is where the joy factor comes in. The hebrew word for joy, simchah, translates to a state of mind and an orientation of the heart. It arrives due to a settled state of contentment, confidence and hope. So simchah, joy, stems from hope, a hope that results from an orientation of the heart. It poses interest then that orientation refers to a change, an adjustment, or an acclimation, because this means that joy really results from a changed heart. The human heart fixes on self, self happiness, self will, self …show more content…
For me, this aspect depends entirely on the first. In order to believe that good predominates over evil, we must have a guideline. Without a guideline we question right from wrong, good from evil. This questioning leads to relativistic morals, and relativism bears the terrifying truth that humans with selfish hearts establish their own moral standards. This subjective morality allows for a murderer’s justification, a clear conscience for the husband who left his family, the rationale for stealing, and the grounds for every other sinful action to count as acceptable. Because, who has the right to say they did anything wrong? A society of relativism most certainly instigates its own downfall. Those hesitant to believe our society demonstrates this corruption need only to look around, ideas that gender is simply a social construct bombard us, our culture promotes the message that marriage bears no importance and consists of nothing more than a piece of paper designed to keep women down, and life, the greatest gift, is disregarded to the point that a human fetus even with a beating heart, a formed human body, and a conscious brain has less of a right to life than a cat. In view of all this lies the reason why we desperately need a guideline. A person blinded by their own evil and dead in their own sin cannot possibly believe good predominates over evil, for their view accommodates irrefutable