It feels like some people are just naturally optimistic ― glass half-full types who seem to breeze through hardship while the rest of us spiral. But optimism doesn’t have to be an innate quality that you either have or don’t. In fact, it might be something you can learn and practice.
That’s the premise behind “practical optimism,” a framework developed by psychiatrist Dr. Sue Varma that she believes can transform the way you approach everything from daily stress to major adversity. It’s realistic, actionable and the opposite of “toxic positivity.”
“Practical optimism is a proactive, deliberate, mindful approach to life,” she told HuffPost. “The reality is that only 25% of optimism is genetic. The rest of it is learned.”
Varma is the author of “Practical Optimism: The Art, Science, and Practice of Exceptional Well-Being” and an expert on all things resilience. She developed her framework over 20 years of clinical practice, beginning at the epicenter of one of the most devastating events in U.S. history.
“I started my career right after finishing residency as the medical director of the 9/11 mental health program at NYU,” she said.
As Varma treated first responders and civilians affected by the Sept. 11 attacks for PTSD, depression and anxiety, she was struck by a subset of survivors who came in for monitoring but never seemed to develop severe mental health symptoms.
“I remember asking one woman, ‘What’s your secret?’” Varma recalled. “And she said, ‘My purpose.’ She would come to the program even when she didn’t have to. She volunteered. A lot of patients had agoraphobia or panic disorder. She would go to their homes, pick them up, travel an hour and a half into the city. She was really an activist in meetings to get more funding.”
That notion of purpose became the foundation of what Varma calls the eight pillars of practical optimism ― a roadmap that anyone can follow.
“I thought to myself, how can we take it to not only treat my patients but use it as a preventative tool so that people don’t get mental health symptoms or just how to deal with the ‘little t’ traumas, the small everyday traumas of life ― the hassles, ups and downs, breakups, job losses,” Varma said. “The same type of thinking that helps people cope with ‘Big T’ traumas like 9/11 also helps them with little t’s.”
What Practical Optimism Is — And Isn’t
What’s important to understand about practical optimism is that it’s very different from toxic positivity. It is not telling yourself everything will be fine when it won’t. And it is not quite the same as resilience, though they’re related.
“Resilience is about bouncing back from adversity, but practical optimism is about thriving in the face of it,” Varma said. “Resilience assumes something bad happened to you and asks how well you recover. But I don’t want to just recover because recovery is about going back to a baseline. A lot of people had really shaky foundations and bad baselines to begin with.”
She’s equally clear about what distinguishes practical optimism from the relentlessly upbeat, Pollyanna vibe.
“Toxic positivity is like, ‘Rah rah, everything will work itself out,’” Varma said. “That can be very dismissive without really understanding what you’ve gone through. Sometimes we just want to vent and be heard, to have someone hold us emotionally and maybe even physically, but toxic positivity says, ‘Just get over it and look on the bright side!’”
Don’t confuse practical optimism with toxic positivity.
But that’s not what optimism, and especially not what practical optimism, really means.
“Practical optimism is taking a very realistic approach, weighing the pros and the cons of decisions, and ultimately, it’s about action,” Varma explained. “Extreme optimists may act too quickly, while extreme pessimists deliberate and perseverate without making any decisions. So practical optimism marries the best of both worlds.”
She gave the example of getting a borderline cholesterol result from your bloodwork. An extreme optimist might bury their head in the sand, take no action and never follow up because they think everything will work itself out. Meanwhile, an extreme pessimist is too afraid to go to the doctor at all because they fear a bad test result.
In this way, both extremes are neglecting their health. But a practical optimist will process the news and take the concrete steps needed to address the issue.
“The problem with pessimism is twofold,” Varma explained. “You overestimate the risk of bad things happening, and you underestimate your ability to deal with it. Practical optimism helps you get more accurate in your assessment of risk ― and then beefs up your coping mechanisms.”
She pointed to a number of studies that back up the benefits of cultivating this kind of outlook. Optimists have a 35% lower risk of heart attack, stroke and cardiovascular death, according to a meta-analysis of 229,000 people published in JAMA Network Open. A 2026 study in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society found that the most optimistic people had nearly a 40% lower risk of dementia than the most pessimistic — even after controlling for exercise, smoking, depression and chronic illness.
Other research suggests the most optimistic people live, on average, 11 to 15% longer and have significantly higher odds of reaching age 85. There are also benefits in terms of inflammation and immune function, wound healing, pregnancy, relationships, anxiety and depression, work and general health-promoting behaviors.
“There are head-to-toe benefits,” Varma said. “And since 75% of optimism is learned, these are skills that anyone can build.”
How To Practice Practical Optimism
Varma’s framework rests on eight pillars, which she sees as an eight-step action plan that starts with having a vision or intention and ends with making it a reality. The first pillar is purpose.
“Purpose could be big P in life, like, what do I want to achieve? Or it could be little P ― what do I want to do today, in this meeting or at this event?” she said. “It’s about being very concrete with your intentions. Even a brisk 10-minute walk has been shown to boost people’s purpose. Part of purpose is also experiencing joy and pleasure. It’s not just drudgery and accomplishing big things.”
The second pillar is processing emotions, which Varma breaks down into a four-step framework: name it, claim it, tame it, reframe it.
“Name the antecedent ― what is bringing you down?” she said. “The more granular you can get, the better,” she said. “Then claim it ― where in the body are you manifesting these symptoms? Then tame it. For some people, it’s a one-minute meditation. For others, it’s journaling, deep breathing or a 15-minute walk. And then reframe it. Is there a positive spin you can put on the situation?”
But Varma is clear that sometimes there isn’t one. “When I was thinking about my mom getting diagnosed with cancer, what positive spin is there?” she said. “So one important thing I learned is when you are not able to find a positive spin, ask yourself, ‘Is this a problem to be solved or a truth to be accepted?’ That’s really freeing. It’s not giving up but accepting and acknowledging that I’m very limited in what I can do in this particular instance.”
The third pillar is problem-solving, which combines intuition, logic and emotional regulation in order to take action. And the fourth is pride, which is not about arrogance but self-compassion as a way to develop a stable sense of self-worth.
“Perfectionism is such a big part of why so many people are unhappy ― social comparisons, social media, ‘I should have been here by now,’” Varma said. “Studies show that kids who do a five-minute self-compassion exercise before a test end up doing better because they’re not getting paralyzed by shame and guilt.”
The fifth pillar is proficiency, which focuses on building confidence in your abilities, and the sixth is presence ― cutting out mental clutter and reclaiming your attention. Then, the seventh pillar is people ― cultivating relationships, connections and a sense of belonging.
Finally, the eighth pillar is practicing healthy habits, which Varma distills into what she calls the four M’s of mental health: mindfulness, meaningful engagement, mastery and movement.
“This is what’s really tangible as far as how to practice practical optimism,” Varma explained. “I tell people, 10 minutes a day, these are nonnegotiable. I try to have a meaningful engagement, even if it’s just a text message to a friend, just being authentic with someone. Consistent movement every day. Mindfulness might be a short meditation every day. And then mastery is just about investing in a hobby. Play mahjong, something to get into a flow state.”
Taken together, the eight pillars function as both a philosophy and a very practical toolkit ― one that Varma supplements with concrete exercises, including a “best possible scenario” visualization she recommends to patients.
“Envision a problem, envision your path to it and then imagine yourself arriving at the solution,” she said. “Get granular ― feel all the positive emotions associated with it. So many of us never allow ourselves to really get specific about what success looks like.”
She also encourages what she calls “borrowed mastery” — drawing on a sense of accomplishment in one area of life to shore up confidence in another.
“I had a patient going through a divorce who said, ‘I don’t feel like I’m good at anything,’” Varma recalled. “And I said, ‘You are a very good friend.’ She laughed and said, ‘That’s nothing.’ But I said, ‘That means integrity, it means showing up.’ You may be minimizing so many other successes in your life.”
Ultimately, Varma describes practical optimism as something she has to actively practice herself.
“I literally have to practice my optimism because my mind wants to jump toward the worst-case scenario,” she said. “It’s like a yoga practice. Some days it’s five minutes, some days it’s longer. It’s not easy. But it is worth learning.”
