This thought came to my mind while watching the various programs on the news channels about the Optimistic Indian Youth today.

We all are pretty optimistic about the future of the country, about building a strong society, about becoming a developed nation, about creating a large economy, etc

Now we need to properly define this Optimism, and have that definition embedded into our minds.

When I asked some of my friends about what Optimism means to them, the answer I got was, We strongly believe that the future will be better or perhaps even the best.

Well, I am pretty allergic to that word believe or hope, because it sounds like, since everything looks good today, we hope that this feeling of goodness continues, and leave it to the fate or in the hands of somebody else, which we again hope will be better or the best. In other words, this insulates one’s self from participation in the future building activity.

What really suites me is the word action or work.

So may I request all the Indian youth to alter the definition of optimism about the future of India as follows.

We are optimistic about the bright future of India not because we hope so, but because WE will make it so. We are optimistic because WE are building that strong India of our dreams.

Optimism based on hope or faith has an element of uncertainty in it.

On the other hand, optimism based on confidence and awareness about one’s own strength is pretty deterministic.

To put it the other way, we should be optimistic not because we hope for easy questions in the examinations that are to come, but because we KNOW that we have covered the complete syllabus and are confident of scoring a distinction in the examinations