Optimism is strongest when it has already inspected the difficulty.

Optimism that has never examined what could go wrong is fragile, because the first hard fact undoes it. Optimism that has looked directly at the difficulty and still expects a good outcome is a different thing entirely: it survives contact with reality because it already met it. Hope built on avoidance breaks; hope built on inspection holds.

Before committing to a hopeful plan, spend an hour on what could break it and what you would do. Then return to the hope. It will be steadier for having been tested.