> both of those situations are better than sitting at home and thinking "I'm never going to get a job anyways, I might as well not apply". This just shows that

> both of those situations are better than sitting at home and thinking "I'm never going to get a job anyways, I might as well not apply". This just shows that fatalism, whether positive (things will definitely work out) or negative (things will definitely not work out), is a bad thing. It's much better to believe that outcomes aren't predetermined. A negative fatalistic attitude is self-fulfilling. But some people take an extreme lesson from this: that attitude itself is the sole determining factor of any outcome. But it's trivial to show that's wrong. Negativity doesn't stop you from taking action: if you think something bad will happen but aren't fatalistic, you will try to stop it. Conversely, positivity doesn't encourage action: if you believe that a positive outcome is preordained, there's no need to take action.