The book Succeed covers the topic of what kinds of optimism and pessimism help you achieve your goals pretty thoroughly (http://www.amazon.com/Succeed-How-Can-R

The book Succeed covers the topic of what kinds of optimism and pessimism help you achieve your goals pretty thoroughly (http://www.amazon.com/Succeed-How-Can-Reach-Goals/dp/0452297710/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1332871610&sr=8-3 http://www.amazon.com/Succeed-How-Can-Reach-Goals/dp/0452297...). Two big takeaways: 1. Be optimistic when setting high level, year-long goals. But be pessimistic when drawing out all the implementation details of what you'll actually have to do to achieve those goals. 2. Be pessimistic about the difficulty of anything you want to achieve, but optimistic about your ability to conquer those difficulties.