• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Advertising
  • Join PGM
Pepperdine Graphic

Pepperdine Graphic

  • News
    • Good News
  • Sports
    • Hot Shots
  • Life & Arts
  • Perspectives
    • Advice Column
    • Waves Comic
  • GNews
    • Staff Spotlights
    • First and Foremost
    • Allgood Food
    • Pepp in Your Step
    • DunnCensored
    • Beyond the Statistics
  • Special Publications
    • 5 Years In
    • L.A. County Fires
    • Change in Sports
    • Solutions Journalism: Climate Anxiety
    • Common Threads
    • Art Edition
    • Peace Through Music
    • Climate Change
    • Everybody Has One
    • If It Bleeds
    • By the Numbers
    • LGBTQ+ Edition: We Are All Human
    • Where We Stand: One Year Later
    • In the Midst of Tragedy
  • Currents
    • Currents Spring 2025
    • Currents Fall 2024
    • Currents Spring 2024
    • Currents Winter 2024
    • Currents Spring 2023
    • Currents Fall 2022
    • Spring 2022: Moments
    • Fall 2021: Global Citizenship
    • Spring 2021: Beauty From Ashes
    • Fall 2020: Humans of Pepperdine
    • Spring 2020: Everyday Feminism
    • Fall 2019: Challenging Perceptions of Light & Dark
  • Podcasts
    • On the Other Hand
    • RE: Connect
    • Small Studio Sessions
    • SportsWaves
    • The Graph
    • The Melanated Muckraker
  • Print Editions
  • NewsWaves
  • Sponsored Content
  • Digital Deliveries
  • DPS Crime Logs

An Optimist Flirts With Cynicism

October 4, 2016 by Kelly Rodriguez

Art by Peau Porotesano

It’s common for older high school students to experience cynicism during the “inevitable and difficult transition” that is high school to college, according to Nancy Faust Sizer’s article “‘Enhancing’ the truth in order to compete destroys students’ optimism, promotes cynicism,” published in the Brown University Child & Adolescent Behavior Letter in September 1998. Faust Sizer interviewed many high school seniors and observed that when stress piles up, keeping up appearances gets harder, especially with the college process.

I’ve always leaned more toward being an optimist, and I’ve been one for as long as I can remember. But, in junior year of high school, reality set in.

My ability to look on the bright side was challenged. I was struggling through a fallout with my best friend, my family situation began to show signs of instability and my theater responsibilities were starting to feel like a chore. I found myself thinking negatively often. My peers around me would complain about all sorts of things and although I wasn’t comfortable with doing that before, I started doing it just as much as they were.

When I graduated high school, I was burned out from trying to project the happy girl everyone knew. I found myself dwelling on the dark side like I had observed from my most cynical friends in high school. I was not comfortable being the optimist I thought I was.

Coming to Pepperdine, I confronted the inner disharmony I was experiencing. I returned back to my bubbly self. As more life has happened, however, I’ve come to realize that the two extremes shouldn’t work independently. There should be a balance between the two, resulting in what is known as optimistic realism.

Realistic optimists combine the positive outlook of optimists and the ability to discern situations like cynics, according to Tia Ghose’s This Personality Type is Linked to Success and Happiness published on the website LiveScience on August 23, 2013. The article references a study done by organizational psychology researcher Sophia Chou of National Taiwan University where Chou found that realistic optimists tended to be more successful and happy than those that were unrealistic optimists and full realists.

Like the article says, I’ve seen that my developing cynicism balances out my optimistic tendencies. The cynic tendency to look at situations for what they are keeps me from being naive about things and helps me to understand how a situation is actually unfolding. Likewise, the optimistic tendency to search for the good keeps me from losing hope. The cynic inspires the optimist to take action.

A similar conclusion is found in British philosopher Julian Baggini’s article “In praise of cynicism,” published in The Guardian on July 10, 2013. Baggini is the co-founder of The Philosopher’s Magazine and has written books on topics such as personal identity, free will and British philosophy.

“We can’t make things better unless we see quite how bad they are,” wrote Baggini. “We can’t do our best unless we guard against our worst.”

Of course, I’m still learning how to achieve that balance. Fortunately, I have many opportunities to practice. How am I going to interact with people I do not necessarily agree with? How am I going to handle the pressures of my career? How am I going to think about my family situation? How am I going to handle my romantic life? I don’t have any specific answers yet but it will help to keep a clear head and a happy heart.

__________________

Follow Kelly Rodriguez on Twitter: @KRodrigNews

Filed Under: Perspectives Tagged With: balance, cynicism, emotional balance, happiness, Inside Out, Kelly Rodriguez, Mental health, optimism, The Optimist's Guide to Cynicism

Primary Sidebar

Categories

  • Featured
  • News
  • Life & Arts
  • Perspectives
  • Sports
  • Podcasts
  • G News
  • COVID-19
  • Fall 2021: Global Citizenship
  • Everybody Has One
  • Newsletters

Footer

Pepperdine Graphic Media
Copyright © 2025 ยท Pepperdine Graphic

Contact Us

Advertising
(310) 506-4318
peppgraphicadvertising@gmail.com

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
(310) 506-4311
peppgraphicmedia@gmail.com
Student Publications
Pepperdine University
24255 Pacific Coast Hwy
Malibu, CA 90263
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube