Keep the balance. The expert named the skill that helped Bill Gates in his business

Bill Gates said that he was always worried about whether he would be able to pay his employees. Optimism and pessimism are quite controversial, and often people choose one over the other. But money author and psychology expert Morgan Gausel believes that one of the most important skills is the ability to keep a balance between the two mentioned ways of thinking.

To CNBC, he cited an example from his book, Same as Always: A Guide to What Never Changes.

Successful people find balance

The writer believes that Bill Gates has a hidden skill to find a balance between pessimism and optimism. From the day Microsoft was founded, he insisted that there was always enough money in the bank so that the company could operate for 12 months without any income.

In 1995, that is, 20 years later, he was asked why he was holding so much cash, to which Gates replied that things change quickly, and therefore there are no guarantees for businesses, especially for Microsoft.

In 2007, he recalled worrying about whether he would be able to pay his workers (who were mostly older and had children) if anything.

Gausel explains that Gates combines optimism and confidence with pessimism. A businessman understands that you can only be optimistic in the long term if you are pessimistic enough to survive in the short term.

What is the advantage of “rational optimists”

The author of the book notes that there are optimists who always see only the good. They are so sure of themselves that sometimes they cannot understand when something is going wrong. While pessimists do the opposite. Both are detached from reality.

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In the middle between these two worlds are people whom the expert calls “rational optimists”. They know that failures happen in life, but they remain optimistic because they understand that problems are not the end of everything.

So in any area – from finances to careers and relationships – you have to be able to survive temporary difficulties in order to keep going and enjoy long-term growth.