Opting for Optimism in a Pessimistic World: A Ted Lasso Review

I fell into it again. The bleak, colorless world of pessimism. Thoughts of a dismal future. Spiraling inflation and an impending apocalyptic financial crash that’ll make history look like a gentle falling tide. The collective age of the baby boomer generation rivaling the national deficit as the leans on an already fragile retirement system is padded with trillions of make-believe dollars backed by a contraction of potential violence preceding a world war. Anyone looking at this and finding a silver lining may as well be burned at the stake for not sympathizing with the masses. That is the problem. I found myself on the side of the majority. As Mark Twain would advise, “It is time to pause and reflect.” 

My girlfriend’s daughter wanted to watch a movie that was only available on Apple TV. Leveraging my PS5 offer for 6 months free, I signed up and I fell asleep during the movie. The following day, having run out of content on all my other apps, I decided browse the catalog and came across Ted Lasso. Seeing the claims for best comedy I decided to watch an episode before heading to my dad’s gift exchange. I found the show charmingly entertaining. Ted, an American college football coach, just won a state college championship in his first year. His coaching methods is reflected by an impressive set of dance moves with his winning team in the locker room in glorious celebration. In a shocking move, he accepts a job in Europe as a football (soccer) coach and the comedy begins. Filled with cultural humor based in miscommunication in contrasting upbringings and backgrounds, the coach tries to take a broken team and put them back together through his eternal optimism in what appears to be the most pessimistic environment in the world, England. 

Ted Lasso is the personality type I admire the most. Why? Because it’s the opposite of me. Have you noticed we tend to admire qualities that we don’t have? In the same respect, other people admire qualities we have but they don’t have. It’s an endless cycle. The answer is to be grateful. I like Ted’s character because he is extroverted, quick-witted, genuinely interested in others, and has a self-sacrificing nature that you can’t help but root for him. Although this character is fictitious, I’ve met plenty of people who shine as brightly as he. Sometimes the light is so bright, people are blinded to the beauty of optimism. They instead respond by using their weapons of words and actions to dim that light so they can bring it down to their darker levels. It seems like it takes an enormous amount of courage to remain optimistic. In Ted’s case, he makes it look effortless but I believe we can get close to that in reality.

I instantly recognized that Ted uses principles found in How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. It was a comical demonstration of said principles as Ted himself struggles with the reality of his coaching position. The challenges he faced in situations that appeared impossible to overcome, he remained undeterred in his beliefs and convictions. Going so far as admitting that he didn’t care about winning and prioritized the player’s feelings and character on and off the field. The core fundamental principles from the book are as follows:

Principle 1: Don’t criticize, condemn or complain.

Principle 2: Give honest and sincere appreciation.

Principle 3: Arouse in the other person an eager want.

There are several more gems in the book including six ways to make people like you as well as principles for winning people to your way of thinking and even leadership principles. However, these three are the simplest to understand and implement straight away. Ted is a problem solver. He avoids criticizing, condemning or complaining even with the most difficult of his players. He searches endlessly for methods to win players over to his side. He always affirms every positive action and you can see the characters eat them up. He uses relationships surrounding players to discover what their core desires are and tries to use that as a proverbial carrot to guide them to the vision for the team that wins games. It’s a refreshing reminder to what I need to do to become the person I want to be. Thanks to this show, I have a clearer image in my mind and can ask myself, what would Ted Lasso do? Now that I’m finally done with this post, I think I’ll go watch season 2. Cheers and keep hustling.

 

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