We watched a Nova program on PBS that showed biologists introducing two packs of wild dogs onto African plains to get more fear into the animals that live there. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/video/natures-fear-factor/
We tend to think that life with no fear is good and that fear is bad. I guess that overwhelming fear can take over the body and leave me trembling and incoherent. I keep reading that thinking positively and being happy is good although the book by Barbara Ehrenreich, "Brightsided", does a good job of explaining how positivity can be taken too far. You may know about the character Pollyanna. Evidently, the name and the character who irritatingly sees the up side of every damned thing comes from the 1913 children's book by the same name. Roger Bullis will be happy to know that anyone with Kindle Unlimited can borrow the book for $0.00 or the book can be fully purchased for $0.00. Look it up in Amazon's book section if you are interested.
I am confident that many people, especially old men, can explain that life is tough and not a piece of cake. There is pain and loss behind every other bush. Voltaire knew that back in 1759 when he wrote "Candide", a satire in which his Dr. Pangloss (glosses everything) glosses everything. Alec Baldwin is a modern day gusher who compliments your eyes, your hands, your furniture, your friends, your…… in the Friends episode "Enthusiastic Parker".
You will be happy to know that it is still true that alertness and awareness of predators and predicaments is best mixed with open-eyed awareness of life's gifts and your stunning good fortune. Yes indeed, things could be worse. That's about as far as Midwesterner care to venture toward optimism.
