Lessons I Learned From Walt, Part 2 - Optimism

By Tyler Braun 

As a child I would tell my mother, “I’m an optimistic optimist!” before galavanting off to save an invisible fair maiden on my stick horse. I was a very upbeat kid, as most children are, unbeaten by the unfairness and malice the world sometimes holds as an adult. Children are always optimistic, playful, even jubilant, but as we get older that joie de vivre seems to wain until it all but disappears. Walt, while prone to occasionally donning a bad attitude (what his employees called his “bear suit” days), was an eternal optimist. He never let the harshness of life get him down for very long. He was always looking up, trying to see the positive in life rather than the negative. That spirit of optimism permeates the Disney brand to this day, the so-called “Disneyfied” way. Many critics tend to use this word as a derogatory slant, but I applaud the Disney company for following in Walt’s footsteps and trying to bring a little more light into the world.

Walt’s insistence on his movies having a positive outlook helped shape the brand’s specific “Disneyesque” style. All Disney movies inevitably end on a high note, the veritable “Happily Ever After” moments. Even today people will always leave a Disney movie with a smile on their face and a positive outlook in their minds. This is not a coincidence. Walt instilled in his brand that light-hearted and uplifting spirit that has carried his company through nearly one hundred years. Had it not been for Walt’s guidance over the forty years he ran the Disney company, we could see a very different movie studio today.

Tyler Braun