Short YouTube mini-chapter by Brian Johnson contrasting learned helplessness with learned optimism. It recounts Martin Seligman’s dog experiments demonstrating learned helplessness and urges cultivating optimism as a skill — like a muscle — to protect psychological and immunological health.
Hi, this is Brian with another mini chapter from A Philosopher's Notes. This one's called hello, Helplessness and Optimism. Optimism. It's principle number one. All the great teachers, from Aurelius and the Buddha to the modern gurus and scientists, tell us the same thing. If we can't control the contents of our consciousness and tame those gremlins of fear and anxiety and self doubt, none of the rest of this stuff matters. Period. Before Martin Seligman started studying optimism and happiness and meaning, he spent a couple decades studying the opposite of optimism. Helplessness. Imagine a study with two dogs. They're both given shocks at random intervals. One can press a lever to stop the shocks, the other can't. The first dog quickly discovers how to stop the shocks and is fine. The other dog, the one who can't do anything about the shocks, eventually gives up and curls into a helpless little ball in the corner as the shocks continue. Eek. That's part one of the study. Part two. Those same dogs are put into a new environment. This time, both dogs can easily avoid the shocks. The healthy dog quickly discovers the trick and is fine. The other dog, even though it now has the power to change things, just gives up, curling into a ball as the shocks continue and continue and continue. The dog has learned helplessness. And so have we. After being shocked by life so many times throughout our lives, too often we learn helplessness and just give up, forgetting that even though we might have been morons many times before, we always have the ability to choose a more effective response to whatever challenges we're currently facing. Know this. Choosing to curl up in the corner or in bed as we helplessly let life shock us again and again is the quickest way to ensure we're depressed and in the process, destroy our psychological and immunological health. The antidote. We've got to learn optimism. Let's learn how. But first, how about a quick look at crazy monkeys and ants? That is the next chapter. So there you go. Learned helplessness versus learned optimism. Let's focus on developing our optimism. We can do it. Just like you build a muscle by going to the gym, you build your optimism by putting certain ideas into practice. We're going to explore more of those soon. In the meantime, hope you enjoyed. Have an awesome day.
