Be an optimist: Find the bright spots

Optimist Club members from around the world are gathering in Baltimore, Maryland this weekend for the 93rd Annual Optimist International Convention. At this time the organization will train incoming district leaders, honor those who met defined goals in the year before, and hopefully motivate everyone to help this year's leaders achieve goals for this year.

Optimist Club members, on behalf of the Optimist Clubs they represent, also use this time to tweak the bylaws and elect candidates for the International Board of Directors, International Vice Presidents-elect and the International President.

In this time of declining membership in social service organizations, one might ask, who would be prepared to lead such an organization? Who indeed?

I believe the leader should be above all, an optimist. As Dan Heath says in the attached video "How to Find Bright Spots", we have to find, celebrate and reward positive achievements. We spend too much time on looking for fixes to perceived problems when reinforcing the positive actions would achieve so much more.

As for Optimist Clubs, there are districts and individuals who succeeded. A wise leader would assemble those individuals pronto; and ask them to help reproduce their model for all.