The media's 24/7 barrage of bad tidings and other distractions (such as the fiscal cliff countdown clock that appeared on this website) serve to frighten rather than educate. The best way I have found to develop optimism is to study history. It will help you put today's headlines and countdown clocks into historical perspective.
The last century has contained most of the history altering events that we are likely to experience in the future — war and peace, a growing economy, a declining economy, bull and bear markets, inflation and deflation, high and low interest rates and countless other frightening events that now reside on the timeline of things long forgotten. By reading today's headlines instead of history, you're left with the impression that we live in unusual times but each decade is unusual in its own unique way.
I am bored by those who assert that the dark future they envision in their fevered dreams is a certainty. Those bearded, white-robed seers holding "The End Is Near" signs have gone digital and the Internet gives them a global microphone. It requires no special insight to complain about the budget deficit, a dysfunctional Congress, the national debt, high unemployment, slow economic growth, etc. ad nauseam.
