The optimist.
I'd rather be an optimist and wrong than a pessimist and right.
Tumbleweed Diaries — Warrior Series
The Optimist Who Was Willing to Be Wrong
“I’d rather be an optimist and wrong… than a pessimist and right.”
That feels like a dangerous sentence for a man who once sharpened his identity like a blade.
Last week, I wrote about the egoic voice of service—the part of me that wants to help, but also wants to be right while helping. The subtle intoxication of being the one who knows. The quiet applause of inner correctness.
Then I headed north, up Highway 395, into the long spine of the Eastern Sierras. Granite shoulders. Snow still clinging to the high places. Desert floor wide open like a question that refuses to be answered.
Bill was driving. I was talking.
Or maybe sparring.
Because somewhere along that highway, I realized something:
I’ve been living as a gladiator of the present moment.
I don’t just believe in the now.
I defend it.
I will step into the arena and go hand-to-hand with anyone—philosopher, physicist, or poor unsuspecting soul at a meeting—who wants to argue that suffering doesn’t come from yesterday and tomorrow.
I’ll plant my feet in the sand and declare:
Peace is here. Now. Always now.
And I mean it.
But here’s where the story bends.
Because even truth, when carried like a weapon… starts to feel like ego.
Somewhere between Lone Pine and Bishop, the conversation drifted into physics. The kind of talk where equations stretch so far they begin to tremble. Where even the sharpest minds admit—quietly—that something isn’t quite adding up.
Not wrong. Just… incomplete.
The math starts to vibrate.
And I thought—there it is.
That same vibration exists on the spiritual path.
But it doesn’t show up at the beginning.
It shows up when you get close.
Very close.
Close enough that the identity you’ve built—your name, your past, your future, your résumé of becoming—starts to crack under the pressure of something simpler.
Something quieter.
Something that doesn’t need defending.
Most people don’t arrive there gently.
They arrive through collapse.
A market turns.
A relationship ends.
A body gives out.
A plan fails.
And suddenly the identity—built carefully out of yesterday’s victories and tomorrow’s promises—loses its footing.
The earthquake comes.
And in the rubble, there’s a moment.
A strange, undeserved moment of clarity.
Not because anything was fixed.
But because something stopped.
For just a second… the noise went quiet.
And in that quiet, there was peace.
That’s the part no one prepares you for.
Not the fall.
The peace after the fall.
Because it doesn’t make sense.
You should feel broken.
You should feel afraid.
You should feel like you’ve lost everything.
But instead… there’s this subtle presence.
Unbothered. Untouched.
Available.
And that’s where the Warrior gets confused.
Because now he has a new truth.
And what does he do?
He sharpens it. Names it. Defends it.
Builds a new identity around it.
“I am the one who lives in the now.”
And just like that…
the ego is back. Wearing spiritual armor.
I saw it in myself the other day.
Sitting in a meeting. Listening.
Judging.
They were speaking about awareness.
And I thought—they’re not aware.
I felt it rise in my gut. That resistance. That tightening.
That need to correct.
And later, I even went searching for validation.
To prove I was right.
And I was.
But I was also completely wrong.
Because the moment I needed to be right…
I had already left the now.
There’s a line from an old story about warriors:
You have to kill your name before it kills you.
I used to think that meant sacrifice. Discipline. Strength.
Now I think it means something much quieter.
Stop introducing yourself to the moment.
Stop bringing your past into it.
Stop negotiating your future inside it.
Just arrive.
We spend our lives building identities.
Careers. Relationships. Status. Stories. Profiles.
Even spiritual ones.
We polish them. Protect them.
Insure them against theft.
And yet…
The only place we ever actually live
is the one place identity doesn’t exist.
Now.
No résumé.
No projection.
No defense.
Just breath.
Just awareness.
Just this.
So here’s the playful heresy of the optimist:
What if the safest identity…
is no identity at all?
What if the thing we’re trying to secure
was never real enough to be stolen?
We guard our Social Security numbers.
We guard our reputations.
We guard our stories.
But the moment?
The moment requires no protection.
It cannot be taxed.
It cannot be taken.
It cannot be improved.
It’s already whole.
My spiritual number these days?
Zero.
Not as emptiness.
But as completion.
Nothing missing.
Nothing added.
And I can feel the gladiator in me still pacing.
Still wanting to step forward and say—
“This is it. This is the truth.”
But today… I let him rest.
Because maybe the Warrior’s final evolution
isn’t winning the argument.
It’s laying down the sword.
Even the one made of truth.
I’d rather be an optimist and wrong…
And sit quietly in the now…
Than be right
and miss it completely.
Arvid P Croonquist
The blog from the Tumbleweed Diaries Warrior series
.
You suggest that choosing to view situations with hope and positivity enriches life and fosters resilience, even when you’re wrong.
I agree because it encourages us to see setbacks as stepping stones to spiritual ascension, if we are “aware”, that is😂
It’s interesting how optimism can sometimes feel risky but ultimately helps to open the door to new growth and new realms of possibility, both in the now and in the mystery of what’s realizable. It can be very exciting!
A great read. Thank you Paul.