The Surprising Science of Cynicism & Hope | Jamil Zaki

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Episode Transcript:

Jamil Zaki: [00:00:00] Cynicism is not a very critical way of viewing the world. It’s not a very scientific way of viewing the world. So when you have a blanket assumption that everybody’s on the take, you stop paying attention to the cues that could actually help you learn about the world. All we have to do to become more hopeful is to pay closer attention, right? There’s this stereotype that hope is blinkered, that it’s this pair of rose-colored glasses we put on. In fact, we’re all wearing, or most of us at least are wearing mud-colored glasses right now, right? Hope is a matter of taking those off and seeing the world through less of a biased lens, not more.

Jonathan Fields: [00:00:39] Okay, so let’s be honest. It is easy to feel disillusioned these days to become a cynic. A relentless stream of negative news and topics, social media feeds paints a pretty bleak picture of humanity, kind of rife with greed and selfishness. Doom and gloom. It makes you start questioning are people really capable of fundamental goodness or positive change? Or are people in the world just bad, not even capable of being better? Nobody’d blame you for defaulting to a cynical point of view, but it turns out there are powerful reasons not to give in to this tendency. In fact, cynicism can not just crush your spirit. It can damage your relationships, your career, your health, mental health, and life. There is a powerful science-backed alternative, not just hope, but what my guest today, researcher Jamil Zaki, calls hopeful skepticism. So Jamil is a psychology professor at Stanford who has spent over two decades rigorously studying the science of human connection, empathy, cooperation and trust. His book, Hope for Cynics The Surprising Science of Human Goodness. It makes a really powerful, data-driven and story-driven case that shatters our cynical assumptions. And at the core, human beings are actually far kinder and more generous and more aligned in our hopes than we give each other credit for. The research proves this out. The ugliness that we focus on is the exception, not the rule, and Jamil’s insights reveal the dangerous inaccuracies of assuming the worst about one another, opening a window into the truth that we are surrounded by a, quote, secret majority wanting the same positive changes we do. Embracing that reality and a mindset of hopeful skepticism just might unlock our ability to build the connections and the communities and momentum to create the better world that we all crave. So excited to share this conversation with you! I’m Jonathan Fields and this is Good Life Project.

Jonathan Fields: [00:02:47] This topic cynicism, hope, optimism is very much not just of the moment, but it’s a personal curiosity of mine. I wrote not too long ago about sort of the relationship between creativity and cynicism. And I have been fascinated by really trying to understand what is cynicism, you know, because I think it’s a word that people confuse with different words oftentimes. I was recently also looking at the definition of burnout. The Who designates these three different criteria. And one of them is actually cynicism, which I found really interesting. So maybe an interesting starting point for us is really just when we’re talking about cynicism, what are we actually talking about?

Jamil Zaki: [00:03:27] Yeah, I think this is so important. And as a behavioral scientist, one of my jobs is to help us be clear about words we use to describe ourselves that sometimes get confused with one another. Right? So cynicism is often confused with skepticism or realism, and it’s none of those things. Cynicism is an assumption about people. It’s the belief that in general, people are selfish, greedy, and dishonest. Now, that’s not to say that a cynic will be shocked if they see somebody donate to charity, but they might wonder about that person’s motives. They might say, well, maybe they’re just trying to get a tax break or look good in front of other people. So cynicism is a theory not about people’s actions, but about who we are inside. And it’s a pretty bleak one. I do want to differentiate it from skepticism, right? I mean, I think a lot of people imagine that cynicism is wise or realistic again, but it turns out that cynics are kind of like lawyers in the prosecution against humanity. Right? If you have a blanket assumption about people, you let that assumption shape what you notice about them. You cling to any evidence that people are cruel or selfish, and you kind of ignore any evidence that they are positive or kind or generous. Skepticism is an openness to all information, whether it matches your assumptions or not. And so if cynics think like lawyers, skeptics think a little bit more like scientists.

Jonathan Fields: [00:04:58] So would it be fair to say that I’m just thinking of examples in my head? You know, that somebody says something to me and I immediately just say, that is utterly impossible. Like it’s just no. Whereas a skeptic would say, like, I really doubt that, but it sounds like there’s actually probably some overlap between cynicism and skepticism. But maybe skepticism is sort of like cynicism, but with optimism mixed in, or a sense of possibility mixed in.

Jamil Zaki: [00:05:28] What I would say is skepticism, but not cynicism is characterized by curiosity, right? Sure, I have gut instincts. I have starting points. Nobody is saying that we should cast off any of what we’ve learned in our past, but a skeptic is willing to say, well, yeah, I have this belief. You’re telling me something that’s different. Let me hear you out. You know, what is the evidence that you have for that? Now, I’m going to put your claim through its paces, just like I do my assumptions. But I’m not going to just rest with what I think I know and just hold that as a, you know, an obvious truth forever.

Jonathan Fields: [00:06:07] Yeah, I mean, cynicism also, you described it in the context of a feeling about other people, other beings, maybe other communities even. Could this also just be applied to systems, circumstances, paradigms, not just individuals?

Jamil Zaki: [00:06:21] Absolutely. I think that in general, cynicism is mostly a human theory, a theory of human nature. But human nature, of course, builds all of many of our social systems and structures. And there, I think, is another way that cynicism can get in our way in terms of our understanding of what’s possible. Right. I think a lot of us don’t very much like the systems that our society has built. We see injustice, inequality and unhappiness everywhere. So a big question you might have is is anything else possible? Can we reform, can we advance, can we change? And if you are a cynic in your views of people, well, then your answer might be not really. If our broken systems reflect our broken human nature, then there’s nothing we can really do to change any of that. So cynics end up admitting defeat, waving the white flag, saying, yeah, I don’t think things can get much better. Cynicism tends to dampen or limit not just our feeling about other people now, but our hopes for a future that we could build together.

Jonathan Fields: [00:07:31] It’s kind of funny too, because. So I live in Colorado right now. We’ve been here for about four years, but my entire adult life before that, I was in New York City. That was my home for three decades. And New York City has an interesting reputation for for sort of like hardcore long time New Yorkers. You know, you kind of look at it in a very jaded way. You look at a lot of different things, and often I feel like there can be this default, not just a skepticism, but to cynicism. But here’s my curiosity around this. I feel like some people actually revel in their own cynicism. It’s almost like they wear it as a badge. I mean, do you see that? Or is that just the former New Yorker in me looking around and sort of like seeing that.

Jamil Zaki: [00:08:11] I 100% see it, not just as a former New Yorker myself, but also in the science. Well, first of all, since I started working on cynicism and hope, I mean, lots of people email me. A lot of people email me angrily for saying, how can you talk negatively about cynicism? I’m a proud cynic. So what are they so proud of? I think there are three things that cynics think about themselves one, it’s really smart to be cynical that losing faith in people is a sign that you have gotten to know them, that you’re wise, that you are experienced and the opposite of a cynic. Anybody who has faith in people is just a naive chump who’s bound to be taken advantage of. And it’s not just cynics who think that there was all these surveys where people, researchers describe a cynic and a non cynic to a bunch of people and say, well, what do you think about these two people? And 70% of people think that cynics will be smarter than non cynics. 85% of people think that cynics will be socially smarter, for instance, better at detecting liars than non cynics. So in essence, a lot of us put faith in people who don’t put faith in people. There’s a glamour to cynicism, but that glamour turns out to be misplaced. Researchers have looked at data from hundreds of thousands of people, and found that cynics actually do less well on cognitive tests than non cynics, and they’re actually worse at spotting liars than Non-synesthetes because again, as we’ve talked about, cynicism is not a very critical way of viewing the world. It’s not a very scientific way of viewing the world. So when you have a blanket assumption that everybody’s on the take, you stop paying attention to the cues that could actually help you learn about the world. So I think that’s one thing that cynics tend to glamorize about themselves. And we as a culture glamorize about cynicism that maybe we should stop.

Jonathan Fields: [00:10:14] That is so interesting. Right? And it makes actually so much sense if the research shows that because cynicism is really the way you’re describing it, it’s an absolutist worldview. It’s not a discerning worldview. It’s just like all people are X. So if you start from that assumption, you’re not even going to inquire into whether that’s true or not. So the fact of you being able to actually really discern what the truth is of somebody’s nature or a particular interaction or experience probably drops because you’re not even curious about it. You’re just you just make an assumption. Off the bat. And yet, still, as much as you share the research with me, I totally see this worldview of the cynic saying like, I’m I’m more protected from being taken advantage of. I’m not going to be the marker, the chump, and I’m smarter than all those other suckers or all those, you know, people who are going to be prey. But what you’re saying is you’re going to actually be less discerning, so you’re actually more likely to be that Mark.

Jamil Zaki: [00:11:12] I think that’s exactly right. And I also want to build on something else. You’re you’re pulling on here, which I think is really wise. You’re saying not just cynics think they’re right and smart. They also think they’re protected, that it’s a kind of safe way to be. And to me, that’s a second myth about cynicism that’s really worth breaking down. And here, by the way, I do want to express solidarity with and compassion for anybody out there who’s feeling cynical. I mean, as I write in the book, I myself am quite cynical, despite the fact that I’ve studied human goodness for like 20 years. So I stand with you. And for me, cynicism comes from a pretty chaotic early life and childhood. And really, I ended up feeling not very safe a lot of the time. I mean, I was not in physical danger as a kid. I want to be really clear. My parents are excellent people, but there was just a lot of emotional turmoil in our house, and I ended up feeling like, wow, I really can’t count on people and I want to be safe.

Jamil Zaki: [00:12:12] And I think that’s an instinct so many of us have, and especially if we’ve been betrayed or hurt in the past, which basically everybody has, it’s normal to feel disappointed by the people who have hurt us. What cynicism does, though, that I think is less helpful, is it turns disappointment with particular individuals into what I call pre-disappointment about the entire human race. The idea is, well, if I want to be protected, as you said, if I don’t want to be hurt again, the best way that I can do that is to never put faith in anybody, ever. And that’s right at a very shallow level. If you don’t put faith in people, if you don’t take risks on them, yeah, you probably won’t be betrayed. But the thing is that you also probably will lose out on opportunities for friendship, love, partnership, collaboration so much of what makes life beautiful. So cynicism might feel safe in one sense, but at a deeper level, it’s extremely dangerous in that it limits the lives that we can live and how much we can flourish.

Jonathan Fields: [00:13:18] That makes so much sense to me. What’s that famous phrase? A ship in the harbor is safe. But that’s not what ships are made for. Something like that kind of describes that same thing. It’s like, okay, so you’ll be maybe you are like, you feel a little bit, you know, like more protected. But what is the net effect of that going to be on your life? You know. And then what if we’re all cynics and then what’s the net effect of that on society. Yeah.

Jamil Zaki: [00:13:41] You know, I think there’s so much in what you’re saying. I mean, I had never actually heard that saying about a ship in the harbor, but I find it to be so resonant. A ship in the harbor isn’t actually that safe, because without going and getting its paces right, getting tested by sailing, it might. The wood might rot and people might not notice. And the thing is that over the long term, if we are socially isolated, if we pull out and withdraw from trust and from connection, guess what? We get sicker. Right? Cynics, it turns out, over the long term, suffer from more depression and loneliness, but also from more heart disease and diabetes and cellular aging. Cynics even die younger than non cynics because without going out there into the world, without connecting with people, we lose really one of the most beneficial things for our health as social animals, which is social connection. Right. And to your point, if we end up doing that more as a society, we see exactly what we’re seeing now an epidemic of loneliness, anxiety, depression and ill health, especially among younger people, which is really terrifying.

Jonathan Fields: [00:14:55] Are you seeing a surge in cynicism at younger and younger ages? Is there any research that supports that?

Jamil Zaki: [00:15:00] Yes. First, cynicism is surging in general. In 1972, about half of Americans believed most people can be trusted. By 2018, that had fallen to a third of Americans, a drop as big as the stock market took in the 2008 financial collapse. So we are living through a trust deficit and a cynicism boom. But to your point, that’s felt even more by younger people. So, as I just said, about a third of Americans believe most people can be trusted. Among Gen Z, that’s less than 20% who feel that most people can be trusted, and there’s all sorts of reasons for that. We can talk about social media, but I think we should talk about our own messaging to our children and to younger generations. We often teach our kids through our actions and through what we say, that the world is a dangerous and competitive place. In fact, this great researcher, J.R. Clifton at UPenn asked parents, what do you think your kids should think about the world in order to thrive? And more than half of parents thought that their kids would do better in life if they believed the world was dangerous versus safe. Why? Well, because if you think the world is dangerous, you’ll protect yourself. You’ll stay in the harbor instead of going out to sea. But again, when J.R. tested what happens to adults who really do feel the world is dangerous, they do much less well in life. They are less happy and fulfilled. They do less well in their jobs and relationships. So we are steering younger generations towards a more cynical, less trusting view of the world to their peril.

Jonathan Fields: [00:16:43] That is so interesting, right? Because as a parent, I’ve often thought and had conversations with folks. You know, you ask a typical parent what they want for their kids, and often some version of I want them to be happy comes out. But if you really dig into it, I think even more the typical parent wants, you know, well, first I want them to be safe. Yes. And understandably, you know, like you want that for your kid, of course. But what you’re saying is, you know, like there are certain risks, like there’s a certain spectrum of safety where on the one hand it’s helpful, but on the other hand, like, what are you cultivating that you don’t want in the life of that child, who you really just hope that flourishes on, on every level? And it’s interesting to think that, you know, the notion of safety has some downsides to it.

Jamil Zaki: [00:17:29] Oh, 100%. I mean, I as a parent, I experienced this so deeply, you know, my, my daughters and I, if they’re asking me to do something that I think is dangerous and I say, nope, sorry, we can’t do that. And they say, why? I say, well, what’s my most important job? And they say, to keep us safe, because I’ve told them that so many times. I see that as fundamentally honorable and noble and natural to want to protect our kids, of course. But at what point does protection become limitation? At what point are we diminishing our children’s possibilities by focusing so much on their safety? You know, and I think that one example of this is stranger danger. You remember in the 1980s, right? There was all this talk about how well there were kidnappings, the news a whole lot. And, you know, of course, every kidnapping is an absolute tragedy that deserves our compassion. But then we extrapolated from those horrible examples to a view of America that was really inaccurate. I mean, at that time, people would claim to Congress that 50,000 American children were kidnapped and killed by strangers each year when the actual number was more like 100. And again, each one of those is a terrible event, but 150,000 are really different numbers. There was a point in the 1980s that, like half of children thought that they would likely be kidnapped, which is such a really off-base assumption that changes our lives. If you think literally outside your door, there are people waiting to abduct you. Of course you’ll withdraw from social life, but those data that we were given were wrong, and they were guiding us towards behaviors that we probably didn’t need to enact a level of safety that was probably overenthusiastic and a level of interest in the world that was probably under enthusiastic.

Jonathan Fields: [00:19:31] It’s so interesting, right, Because a lot of, you know, I’m a child of those times also. And now as a parent, I think then we we take all those things that we learned and we pass them on to our kids. And now you’re seeing the manifestation of that to a certain extent in, you know, I mean, the whole idea of helicopter parenting and like, never letting your kids take risks and sort of like always controlling their environment. And again, the underlying assumption there is that the world is not a safe place. There is danger all around us. And again, not to belittle the fact that there is some danger out there. Of course there is a lack of safety and there are moments and experiences in people, you know, that would raise the red flags. But when you take that on as a universal worldview, and then that’s really indoctrinates this cynicism about everyone and everything and every circumstance, like, what is the harm that that causes relative to the true risk of the other harms that we imagine into existence?

Jamil Zaki: [00:20:31] Sometimes I think the harm is enormous, and you see it in the mental health crisis that young people are facing and the difficulty that they have sometimes engaging. The good news is that these are choices, and we can make a different choice as well. You know, with my kids, I’ve tried to do a couple of things. One is what we call social savoring. So we try to every day talk about things that other people have done that are kind or beautiful or friendly. And through that we try to balance our scales. Right? Yes, of course there are dangers out there. But look around our neighborhood, look at all these great people helping in whatever ways they can. A second way to build more trust in our kids is to trust them to make more of their own decisions, and solve more of their own problems. My great friend Emile Bruneau, who’s sadly not with us anymore. Called this parenting style under bearing attentiveness. Right? That is, he is there, right? We talk about with our kids or with the people in our lives in general. Hey, I’m here for you if you need me. I’m right here. But I also believe that you can do this on your own. I have faith in you. And it turns out that when kids see that from the adults in their lives, when they feel that they are trusted, they trust right back, they are more likely to trust their peers. They’re more likely to trust their schools and to do better in their social and educational lives. So I think that we can build faith in humanity into our kids by putting faith in them and helping them look more closely at the people around them, not giving them false information, but giving them the truth that actually most people are better than we realize. Mhm.

Jonathan Fields: [00:22:22] And we’ll be right back after a word from our sponsors. You mentioned Emile and you write about him. Share a bit more because, I mean, it sounds like he was such an incredible person and the way he lived his life, especially towards the end, really made an indelible impression on you.

Jamil Zaki: [00:22:41] Emile Bruneau was my friend, but he was also one of my heroes. He was a piece neuroscientist. A lot of people don’t know that’s even a thing. But he used tools from neuroscience to understand why people fall into hatred and conflict and how we might get them out of it. He also had an extraordinary personal life. He was one of the most hopeful and positive people I ever knew. And a lot of the time that I times that we spoke. And this is not just me, by the way, but others too, I’d feel like, is this guy for real? He’s just so positive and he’s seen so much pain. You know, he’s he worked with people in the nation of Colombia during their civil war, South Africa, you know, during racial tensions there. I mean, he just he had seen a lot of conflict. And I thought is, is this guy naive? Is he? Is he living in a bubble? What’s going on? How is he so positive? But it turns out he was not living in a bubble at all. His early life was really hard. His mother, right after Emile was born, developed severe schizophrenia and couldn’t raise him. So Emile had this very chaotic childhood. And he told me that during his adolescence, he made a choice to have faith in people. Right? It wasn’t that he was naive, it was that he saw that there were different paths in front of him, and one path required him to try and see the best in people when he could.

Jamil Zaki: [00:24:02] And so hope for him was hard fought. It was hard won. And as you’re alluding to, it was also tested later in his life. Emile had a young family in 2018 was diagnosed with a glioblastoma, a very severe form of brain cancer that actually took his life two years later. And, you know, we talked shortly after his diagnosis, and I remember him saying he was, of course, sad, you know, and scared, just like any of us would be, especially for his family. And that they would be his kids would be without a father. But he also told me that he was filled with this awareness of how beautiful life is, and he wanted to do everything that he could with the rest of his time, to create more hope in others, to build community, and to pass on his way of viewing the world. He told me during a phone call. He was like, I know that my hope is unusual. I wish I could squeeze it out like toothpaste from a tube and spread it around. And he was one of the big inspirations. One of the reasons that I wrote this book, and I don’t claim to know what he would want to say, but I’ve tried to honor his legacy in at least some small ways through my writing.

Jonathan Fields: [00:25:19] So just a beautiful example of a way to look at and live in the world. And certainly we’re living in a world today where there are ample reasons to default to a lack of safety and to a lack of trust, and to this tone of cynicism. You look around and so many people are just like, really like again, and like, you know, banging my head against the wall and the wall and the wall and the wall. And even if they started out, you know, an optimist and then sort of like got beaten into being a skeptic because, like, they were still trying to stay curious and open and like, maybe things can change. And what can I do and like, are people innately good and how do we access that somehow? How do we connect? And yet, you know, over time, it’s just like every time they try and lean into that worldview, when you get beaten back and beaten down, it’s easy to see how somebody would eventually just get chipped away and land in this place of cynicism and just say, why bother? There’s just nothing that can change any of this. I’m also, like so fascinated often by people who seem to have a better natural ability to resist that, because it does seem like it’s so easy and even very human to eventually default to this retreat.

Jamil Zaki: [00:26:36] It’s absolutely human, and I do this all the time, myself. Again, even after studying cynicism for years and writing a book on it, it’s not like it makes me immune to these same human patterns. And I think one thing that’s really important is to understand and accept that about ourselves, to not shame ourselves for going in that direction because it is natural, but also to when we can stay curious, to stay open minded. Right. I think that human beings have something known as negativity bias. We focus much less on positive information and much more on threatening information, and that probably has helped us. I mean, you can imagine 200,000 years ago somebody who was worried about the saber-toothed tiger prowling down the savanna might do a lot better than the person who’s blissed out by a sunset at that same moment. Right. So it’s good in a way that we are attuned to threats. It keeps us safe. And yet that can become exhausting in a modern context where our media ecosystem is hyper-attuned to give us whatever will keep us scrolling and clicking and watching, which often is a tsunami of negative information. So of course, we are exhausted because there is a combination of something ancient about our minds with a very modern technology that throws gasoline on the fire of that negativity bias. So 100% for me, compassion and understanding if people feel that way. But I think that we need to ask ourselves the question, if we’re coming to that conclusion that nothing can be changed, that nothing will get better, that people really are terrible.

Jamil Zaki: [00:28:22] What is that doing for us as individuals, and what is that doing for us as a community, a culture? And it turns out that cynicism becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It doesn’t just stop things from getting better, it actively makes things worse, right? Cynics in their personal lives treat other people worse. Because if you imagine that other people are terrible, you’re going to try to defend yourself against them even before they’ve done anything wrong. You’re going to be disappointed, right? But it turns out that when we treat people in that way, we bring out the worst in them. People reciprocate our kindness and they retaliate against our cruelty. So cynics often end up making other people selfish and then deciding they were right all along. But that also means that when we act in more positive ways, we can bring out other people’s best instead. So I think that there’s just it’s natural to feel defeated and clobbered by a world on fire. At least a world on fire that we see in the news, which is only giving us really half the story. But if we give in to that thinking forever, then we foreclose on the possibility of anything better, and we might actively contribute to all the problems that we are so scared of.

Jonathan Fields: [00:29:40] It’s such an interesting point, you know, and the whole when you start to look also at the, you know, the broader lens of the news and social media. And now that those things are all largely driven by algorithms and the algorithms we all know at this point, we’ve all read the research or the books or heard the people talking are largely driven by fear, rage and danger because we know that people are attentive to those things just as you are. It triggers a negativity bias, like our brains are on alert when we see those things, so we tend to keep wanting to see them as much as we don’t want to see them. Our brains are saying like more and more and more, we have to stay vigilant. There’s something we we need to that makes us tune in to all these things even more, which fuels the business model that says, give even more of that. So keep reinforcing that worldview of doom and gloom and danger and disaster, basically. And people are bad, and it just keeps pushing us into that cycle of cynicism. So it’s almost like we have to actively do things to battle it effectively, to pull ourselves out of that spin.

Jamil Zaki: [00:30:42] The average person, there are some data suggesting that the average person scrolls on social media for 300ft per day, which is the height of the Statue of Liberty. And it’s so ironic, right? The Statue of Liberty, obviously a symbol of emancipation. And yet, I think the 300ft that we scroll each day make us captives instead to a very bleak worldview. This is called mean world syndrome. The more media we consume, the worse we think people are, and the more we think we’re in danger. And you might say, well, yeah, people who consume media are more informed, so they’re right. But that’s not true either. People who consume more media tend to be more wrong, unduly negative. And this is where actually, for me, spending years marinating in the science of bleak, cynical worldviews actually had this surprising effect of making me much more hopeful. Because the big message that I discovered in this science is that cynicism isn’t just harmful, it’s fundamentally incorrect. There are decades of science demonstrating that people are kinder, more generous, more open-minded, friendlier, and more trustworthy than we give them credit for. Countless examples where, given a chance to make specific predictions about people, we underestimate their capacity for good. Now, this is not to say that there aren’t people who act like jerks or do incredibly harmful things. Of course there are, but the average person underestimates the average person, which is a tragedy because we’re leaving so much on the table. So many opportunities for connection, community buildings, positive social change. But it’s also this incredible opportunity. I mean, this is not just low-hanging fruit. It’s like fruit that’s already fallen on the ground. All we have to do to become more hopeful is to pay closer attention. Right. There’s this stereotype that hope is blinkered, that it’s this pair of rose-colored glasses we put on. In fact, we’re all wearing, or most of us at least are wearing mud-colored glasses right now, right? Hope is a matter of taking those off and seeing the world through less of a biased lens, not more.

Jonathan Fields: [00:33:02] You’ve used the word hope and optimism a number of times in this conversation. So just like we started out by defining cynicism and teasing out the distinction between skepticism. I feel like is also one of these words where it’s kind of murky, and often people look at hope as also like having a dark side. You know, there’s blind hope or, you know, like hope that is, you know, predatory in some way. Take me a little bit more into what you mean by hope. What is hope in the context of how you’re sharing it? And how does that contrast to optimism also?

Jamil Zaki: [00:33:39] Yeah, this is really important. Let’s start with optimism. Optimism is the belief that things will work out well, that the future will be positive. And that’s great. I mean, optimistic people tend to be happier than pessimistic people, but it can be problematic in at least two ways. One, if you think the future is going to turn out just rosy, no matter what you do, you don’t have to do anything right. I mean, this can be a kind of complacent worldview where you just sit on the sidelines and wait for the future that you want. The second is that if that future doesn’t arrive, you might be pretty disappointed, right? In that way, optimism can be a fragile sort of positivity. George Carlin said, scratch a cynic and you’ll find a disappointed idealist. I would amend that to say, scratch a cynic and you’ll find a disappointed optimist. Right. If you just think things are going to be great and they turn out not so great, that can collapse your faith in people and the world very quickly. Right. So I think that a lot of the things that people say about hope, oh, it’s toxic, it’s privileged, it’s complacent. They actually mean optimism. So then what is hope? Hope is not the belief that the future will turn out well, but the belief that it could turn out well. I know that sounds like a subtle difference, but it’s massive because in that could there’s uncertainty, which of course the future actually is uncertain. And in the shadow of that uncertainty, the capacity for our actions to matter in shaping which future arrives. Right. So where optimism might be complacent, hope is actionable. Fierce, right? It’s oriented towards empowering individuals to contribute to the future.

Jamil Zaki: [00:35:30] And it turns out that that means hope is the opposite of privileged, as psychologists see it. And psychologists have been building a science of hope for the last 65 years or so. As they see it. Hope is not an evasion of our problems. It’s a response to problems, right? Hope is especially important not when things are going well, but when they’re going poorly. So a lot of the science of hope looks at people with chronic illnesses, people like Emile with terminal illnesses or people who are disadvantaged. There’s great research by the psychologist Dante Dickson On students in underprivileged school settings, and he finds that students who have hope are more able to envision an educational future they want, and that in turn motivates them to work for it, which in turn makes them more likely to achieve their goals. Hope being like a magnet, pulling us through our actions towards a future we want. And the last thing I’ll say about it for now is that hope is also critical to social change. There’s this sense that cynicism is a radical worldview, and hope is complacent and maybe doesn’t inspire change. The opposite is true. Cynics, because they don’t believe things can get better, are less likely to vote or protest or participate in social movements. Hope is a fundamental part of movements and has been for centuries, right? If you look at activists, people fighting for a better world, of course they see the problems in how things are now, but they also know that things could get better, and they organize communities to help fight for what most most of us want.

Jonathan Fields: [00:37:17] It also seems like the way you’re describing it, along with hope, you know, hope has this sense of possibility that things could change. But along with that also comes, I would imagine, a sense of responsibility, whereas the optimist is just like, things are going to get better. Like, I really there’s nothing that means that I have to do something. I have to participate. I’m just going to I just believe it’ll get better, you know? So if I do something or not, it doesn’t really matter. Whereas Hope is saying it could get better. But, you know, there’s got to be some activation energy that I contribute to the system. And along with that is a sense of responsibility. Like if, if I believe it could and it’s not where I want it to be and I have any capacity to contribute to closing that gap, then I would imagine, like you hope would come along with this sense of obligation, like it’s on me to do something to make this imagined future real. Does that track?

Jamil Zaki: [00:38:11] Absolutely. In fact, I think that cynics and naive optimists share a lot more than they realize. I think of optimism as a form of light complacency, like, hey, everything’s going to be great. I’ll just sit on the sidelines and I see cynicism as a dark complacency. Things are going to be awful no matter what I do, so I might as well sit on the sidelines and hope is the opposite of both. As you say beautifully. It gives us. It compels us to take some responsibility. I see this a lot in work on climate attitudes and beliefs, right? I mean, I myself am terrified of climate change and really saddened by it. And I can tend to be a little bit of a doomer. You know, like thinking there’s just no way out of this situation. But younger people in the climate movement really have no patience for doomers. In fact, there is a social media campaign where they would say they use this hashtag okay, Duma, which is a riff on okay, Boomer, you know, this kind of snarky reply. And I talked with some climate activists, some young climate activists. These are millennials, Gen Z folks who are really working hard and they say, yeah, doomerism is so harmful because once you decide that nothing can change, you stop doing anything. And if everybody decides that nothing can change and stops doing anything, guess what? It’s guaranteed that nothing will change. You know, young people don’t have the luxury of cynicism. They don’t have the luxury of doomerism because they have to live in the rest of this century. And so they need to tend it. And that responsibility comes from a sense of possibility, a sense of hope.

Jonathan Fields: [00:39:53] Yeah. I mean, it’s really interesting in that larger context of of larger social change. Right. Or larger like big issue change, especially if you take climate change like as an example there, and you take a lot of Gen Z’s where there’s a lot of energy mobilizing around them to try and actually like, because they’re inheriting this world that we’re giving to them and they’re not happy about it, which also brings up, you know, it brings up the more nuanced context of harm. You know, when somebody feels like I’m participating in a situation that is causing me current harm, and maybe it really appears like it will continue to cause future harm at a bigger and bigger level that I did not want and I did not participate in creating. This shouldn’t be on me. Like I have hope that this can change, but why is this on me? To be the one to invest the physical labor, the emotional labor, the the, the resources to make this happen? And I could see how how that righteous anger and rightful, in a lot of ways, would also make somebody just want to opt out. And yet, you know the harm just deepens when that happens.

Jamil Zaki: [00:41:05] There’s so much in what you’re saying. I think it’s completely valid to feel. Wait a minute. I didn’t create this problem, and in fact, I’m the one being hurt by it. Why is it my job to step into the light, to take risk? And you see this from marginalized populations throughout history. You know, why was it incumbent on black people who had been harmed by inequality to lead the civil rights movement? Why is it incumbent on LGBTQ people to come out at great risk and advocate for their rights when they were the ones being oppressed? And there’s all sorts of examples like this where, yeah, you could argue it’s unfair and maybe it is. I do want to be clear that in advocating against cynicism, I’m not saying we should put faith in, I don’t know, politicians or people who have done harm in the past. That would be naive and optimistic. And I’m not saying that there is reason for optimism. I’m saying that we should put faith, more faith and more curiosity in each other. Let’s go back to the example of climate change. A former student in my department, Greg Sparkman, did some surveys where he asked thousands of Americans, do you support aggressive policies to protect the climate? And then what percentage of other Americans do you think would agree with that? He found that the average American thinks that a minority, 40% or so of Americans support climate action. The real number is between 65 and 80%. So if you want climate action, you are part of a super majority that you probably don’t know is all around you, right? So it’s fair to lose faith in elites who have put us in this mess.

Jamil Zaki: [00:42:51] It’s less fair and less productive to lose faith in each other, right? And yes, I understand we’re all tired and exhausted, but we can become less exhausted when we realize how many other people want what we want, right? Gregg and others have found that when you give people the real data about what most people want, it energizes them. This righteous anger that you’re describing combines with something that psychologists call efficacy. And it turns out that when you have both of those things, you’re more likely to act right. Efficacy without anger is complacency. Anger without efficacy is helpless cynicism. But both is a sort of emotional fuel, right? I mean, Martin Luther King Jr. Talked about something he called creative maladjustment. He said we should absolutely not be well-adjusted to a culture of racism, oppression and violence. We should be maladjusted, but we should be creative as well. We should realize that by banding together, we can fight for something better. And it turns out that that is hard work. Of course, it shouldn’t be the purview of only people who have been oppressed in the past, but it doesn’t have to be. Most of us want many of these causes. We want to fight for them. And when we do, that can be really energizing as well. I mean, a lot of activism and community building is incredibly healthy for us because we come together with people who share our values, and that actually doesn’t just help us get things done, it helps us feel more connected as well.

Jonathan Fields: [00:44:29] It’s so powerful. And even that one fact that you shared that you know, that we think that 40% of those around us would support this really big thing, but in fact, the numbers potentially up to 85%. Just knowing that, like that psychological shift of thinking, thinking at first that we’re actually in a minority, we’re we’re the weirdos. We’re the outcasts, right? We’re the ones who, like, would have to fight against the mainstream, which a lot of people like. They’re like, look, I want change, but I don’t want to be that person, and I don’t want to be ostracized from my community. I don’t want to be cast out from all these other people. And then if they realize, wait a minute, we’re just not talking. But most of these other people actually believe the same thing as me and want the same thing as me. I don’t have to step out of a place of belonging to actualize these things that I want to happen, but it actually would deepen my sense of belonging. That shift alone, I would imagine, would be huge.

Jamil Zaki: [00:45:23] That is beautifully put, and I couldn’t agree more. Nor could the data agree more. It turns out that not to be too nerdy, but in psychology we call the situation you’ve just described pluralistic ignorance. This is where a group doesn’t know what it wants, right? So or what it thinks. So people in that group, we tend to hear from more extreme voices, more toxic voices, and we confuse them with the majority. So in many cases, and in many ways, we are part of a secret majority in the US where the most data. I’m sure this is true in other countries as well. A vast majority of us want sustainable living, egalitarian living and peaceful living, but we don’t know that we’re part of a huge majority. And so our incorrect cynicism about each other now limits how hopeful we can be about the future. This is another reason that I think skepticism and open-mindedness are so important right now at this cultural moment, because to the extent that we can pay closer attention to each other, not rely on the media and biased perceptions, but rather collect data and focus on what we know, what scientists know about humanity. To the extent we can do that, we awaken to so much common ground that we have. And when we realize that common ground that can give us energy and motivation to act together, and a sense of a future we could create, and then probably a greater chance of actually creating it as well.

Jonathan Fields: [00:47:02] And we’ll be right back after a word from our sponsors. The question that’s lingering in my mind right now is like the capital H, how, you know, if so many of us have defaulted to some level of cynicism, we may not want to quite own that unless, again, you’re wearing that badge and you love the fact that you’re that person. But I think a lot of us, even if we’re we’re there or partially there, we’re like toe dipping cynicism, you know, we want to be in that space you just described, where we feel like we have some level of agency, and that the things that we might do might actually lead to change that we want and that will be accepted in there. How do we just as individuals. How do we start to make that journey? Are the things that we can do on an individual level to start to go from where we may be now, a worldview that’s more doubting and maybe tipped more towards cynicism to one that is more cautious. Skepticism, hope-based. What are some of the things, on a practical level, on an individual level that we can start to think about?

Jamil Zaki: [00:48:00] It’s a great question, and I’ve thought a lot about this for the book. I actually did some little experiments with my own life to try and build what I call hopeful skepticism, right? This is a data-driven scientific perspective where you’re open to evidence, but also the hopeful piece is acknowledging that for many of us, our default settings are too negative, right? So if we pay closer attention, they’re probably going to be pleasant surprises everywhere. When I do this, I focus on a couple of different things. The first is to think differently, and this is what you could consider a practice of curiosity. I call it being skeptical of my cynicism. I’m a person just like anybody else who has negativity bias. I probably have it more than most than a lot of people, but I often find myself coming up with blanket assumptions about, I don’t know, politicians or companies or mistrusting people who I’ve just met, even though they’ve given me no reason to. And what I try to do more these days than when I started work on this book, is to hit the pause button. To interrogate that. I say, wait a minute, Zaki, you’re a scientist. How would you defend the claim that’s bubbling up in your mind right now? How would you defend the claim that this person is out to get you, even though you just met them? How would you defend the claim that every single politician is corrupt? And most often the answer is, well, that is an indefensible claim. There’s no way that I have enough evidence for that. I think that that’s the first step is to kind of fact-check ourselves and realize that a lot of our default mode thinking is not very rigorous.

Jamil Zaki: [00:49:36] It’s actually just a set of instincts that are sometimes right and often wrong. And so if we can rethink and question our assumptions in a scientific way. A second step we can take is to act in more curious ways, more scientific ways. So I try to do what the nun and author Pema Chodron talks about is treating my life a little bit more like an experiment, right? So if I don’t have data about a person, how can I collect it? How can I learn more about them? And one way that I do this is by taking leaps of faith on people. Now, this doesn’t mean that I’m sending my bank information to a prince who’s going to wire me €14.5 million. Um, but rather taking small and calculated risks on the people in my life and on new people as well. And trying to learn from those risks. Right? I mean, oftentimes people surprise us in positive ways, and then sometimes they surprise us in negative ways. Left to our own devices, we will remember those negative events for years or decades, and the positive surprises will float into the landfill of lost memories. Right? So I try when I take leaps of faith on people to actually really pay attention to how things turn out. If somebody impresses me or surprises me, if they step up to meet my trust, I try to note that. You know, I try to really learn from that and say, okay, that surprised me, but maybe it should surprise me less. Maybe I should update my assumptions in light of this new evidence. So those are a couple of steps that I start with.

Jonathan Fields: [00:51:12] I don’t know if you’re at all familiar with Byron. Katie’s what she calls the work. It’s a set of I think it’s four simple questions, but it starts out with like, you know, whenever you’re in a position and you ask, is it true? And then like, where is the what is the evidence? And if you don’t have oftentimes the second you ask like and then you look for the evidence, it’s just whatever assumption you’re making is just not supported. There may be like like hints and stuff like this, but you know, and then if you look, how can I get the evidence? How can I get the information that I need to figure this out? And so I love your sort of like idea of just running a series of experiments. I tend to treat my life very much as just a series of non-stop experiments and projects. I mean, literally like, we’re having this conversation almost 13 years into producing Good Life Project. the name of this has the word project in it, because when I started it, I had no idea what this was or whether it was going to sustain for more than a hot minute. And, you know, but they keep running the experiment and it keeps reinforcing that, yeah, it’s enjoyable and valuable. So. So I love that lens of just saying, like, let me what experiment can I run here to sort of like test the hypothesis of whether this situation or this person is who I think they are or what I think it is. And like you said, also in an intelligent way, like not just blind trust or blind faith, but like, how do I do this in a way where, you know, maybe I’m a little bit risk, I’m a little bit vulnerable, but the information I’ll get from that will be worth whatever the exposure is.

Jamil Zaki: [00:52:36] It’s not just information that we get, it’s also that we change other people when we put faith in them. Right? I mean, we’re talking earlier about self-fulfilling prophecies. And it turns out that when we trust other people, they’re more likely to step up and earn that trust. And so when I take these leaps of faith, I try to do it loudly, right? I mean, a new acquaintance that I was talking with a while ago. And, you know, they asked me a question that I could have responded to with some small talk like, oh, how how are things going at work? You know, and I could have been like, uh, they’re going great. Of course everything’s fantastic. But I chose to be more honest and actually take the conversation to a deeper place by being vulnerable. And that’s an act of trust. But before saying that, I said, hey, you know, you’re asking this question. And actually, really, although we don’t know each other very well, I really trust you. You seem like a really wonderful person. So if you don’t mind, I’m actually going to give you an accurate answer here. And you know that loud trust, that explicit trust that little modifier to the conversation was extraordinarily powerful. It really invited this person to show me who they were while I disclosed and acted in a vulnerable, vulnerable way with them. And it deepened our relationship so quickly. And so I think it’s important to know that when we’re doing these experiments, we’re not just learning, we’re also creating change in our own social lives.

Jonathan Fields: [00:54:08] It’s that whole self-fulfilling prophecy thing to a certain extent. Also, it’s like we set up the people in the relationships to respond to, like the way that we show up initially and when you’re basically like, hey, can we actually change the dynamic from the get go here and somebody takes that bid? It can be just stunningly powerful, I would imagine. Also because it’s so unusual. Yeah. When that happens, it’s like, wait, what? This is going to be real and like deep and interesting. Like, okay, like let’s do this. I wanted to bring into the conversation because I know this is a bigger part of your research over a period of years too, is the notion of empathy and where empathy fits into this conversation.

Jamil Zaki: [00:54:47] I think it fits in really deeply, more deeply, by the way, than I knew when I started my work on cynicism. I thought, oh, this is a departure. I guess I’ll return to empathy when I can. And it turned out that the journey through cynicism actually circled back to empathy naturally. How is that? Well, I think of empathy as truly perceiving one another deeply and outside of assumptions. Right? Taking the lenses that we have are stereotypes and everything off, and instead doing our very best to actually inhabit the world and perspective of another person. Well, it turns out that using empathy as a way to really connect with what other people want, think, and feel brings us right back around to hope, because we realize that what other people want isn’t that different than what we want, and actually that they often have each other’s best interests in mind.

Jonathan Fields: [00:55:46] I love that it feels like a good place for us to come full circle in our conversation as well. So in this container of Good Life Project., if I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up?

Jamil Zaki: [00:55:56] I come back to Freud’s definition of well-being, which is the ability to work and to love. To me, you know, I don’t agree with Freud on everything, but but I love that idea. I think work can be construed as really broad in terms of our ability to contribute to a future that we want to leave our culture better than we found it. And to love is the ability to do all that while immersed in community and connection. And to me, really, those two are fundamentally intertwined. To contribute to the world, in my opinion, is best done together with the people around us and through our relationships. So that’s where my mind goes with that wonderful question.

Jonathan Fields: [00:56:51] Thank you so much.

Jamil Zaki: [00:56:52] Thank you. This has been delightful.

Jonathan Fields: [00:56:56] Hey, before you leave, if you’d love this episode Safe bet, you’ll also love the conversation we had with Robert Waldinger about the power of relationships and their role in living a good life. You’ll find a link to his episode in the show notes. This episode of Good Life Project was produced by executive producers Lindsey Fox and me, Jonathan Fields. Editing help By Alejandro Ramirez. Kristoffer Carter crafted our theme music and special thanks to Shelley Adelle for her research on this episode. And of course, if you haven’t already done so, please go ahead and follow Good Life Project. in your favorite listening app. And if you found this conversation interesting or inspiring or valuable, and chances are you did. Since you’re still listening here, would you do me a personal favor. A seven-second favor and share it. Maybe on social or by text or by email. Even just with one person. Just copy the link from the app you’re using and tell those you know, those you love, those you want to help navigate this thing called life a little better so we can all do it better together with more ease and more joy. Tell them to listen, then even invite them to talk about what you’ve both discovered. Because when podcasts become conversations and conversations become action, that’s how we all come alive together. Until next time, I’m Jonathan Fields, signing off for Good Life Project.