We need hope and optimism, sometimes, when external forces have control over the outcomes that will affect our lives. So these values do not have an action component. At their best, they prepare us to act but hope and optimism alone do not express action.
The closest thing we have to an action, in keeping with hope and optimism, is resolve. We can resolve to persevere and not to be defeated. We might call this internal action, as it expresses an individual’s purposeful attempt to maintain a positive attitude and set of convictions.
Real
Imaginary
Music: Composers, artists, and major works
The stately themes and driving rhythms of Bach’s four Orchestral Suites, bwv 1066-69, capture the spirit of resolve. The great master seems to have drawn inspiration from the four orchestral suites of his second cousin Johann Bernhard Bach, which are decidedly similar in tone and character.
- Orchestral Suite No. 1 in C major, bwv 1066
- Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, bwv 1067
- Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major, bwv 1068
- Orchestral Suite No. 4 in D major, bwv 1069
Other compositions:
- Raga Komal Rishabh Asavari – “a flavor of intense, dark pathos infused with a strange inner dignity” [quotation from the liner notes to a disc featuring Bhimsen Joshi] (performances by Joshi, Bhawalkar, Amir Khan and Thakur)
- Alexander Tchaikovsky, Symphony No. 3, Op. 75
- Widor, Symphony No. 7 in A Minor, Op. 42/3