Learning more about history and the hideous tentacles of empire is...depressing. Seeing the state of the world is...depressing. My family pleading with me to vote Biden is...depressing. Being an environmental science student is...you get the gist. The only sources of positivity I see are moderately-propagandistic videos from CGTN and from PRC simps about some of the great things China is doing, but I can't completely internalize those because I am still stuck in the western/american regime of 'Positive news about China/Socialist Countries is always wrong or exaggerated' (which I'm trying to work thru) so yeah.
Is there anything to be optimistic about in the world?
You're alive. That's a gift. Food and water comes to you every day, and the earth gives so that can happen. You are mentally enough to post here.
Optimism is its own end. And the world's circumstances can't, really, convince us one way or the other. It's, ultimately, a choice. Which I think you recognize on some level because you've come to ask this.
If you can find optimism, you are healthier, and you are more capable of generating the change we need. So you should be optimistic, for basic instrumental reasons. Which means all you can really do is try to practice being optimistic.
I find it helps to, every once in a while, find some space by myself and verbalize out loud the things I'm grateful for. I'm not a very optimistic person, but I find that practice helps a lot. :heart-sickle: