I received one of the highest compliments the other day from a coworker.  She called me the "resident pessimist" of our organization.  This sounds like a negative thing, and it sort of is.  But to me it's incredibly positive. 

I've kind of always been a negative person.  I like to think of myself as a realist or a pragmatist, but this often comes across as negativity.  This bothered me for a while, most notably during my conservative Christian years, because negativity seemed sort of out-of-character for a modern Christian.  Plus, negativity is generally viewed as unfavorable in relationships and social settings. 

But after my emergence from religion, I settled on the personal philosophy of just being myself, which included embracing my negativity.  I'm not negative about everything; I enjoy some things, and I like some people.  But if someone is being overly enthusiastic about something they have no experience with (which happens at my job all the time) or making ridiculous claims that have no basis in physical reality, I have no problem raining on their parade with cold hard facts.  In fact, I enjoy it.  Being ruthlessly pragmatic to the point of negativity is sort of how I was born to be.  I'm finally ok with that, and it feels good to be recognized for it. #psychology