QUOTE : Being a realist does not mean seeing the truth for what it is. It is a question of determining our relationship with the truth in the way that is most beneficial for us. What do you achieve by accepting reality as it is? What will that offer apart from a slew of petty decisions that are neither meaningful nor valuable on their own? You can't do anything but draw up endless lists of what you need and do not have. What difference does that make? If anything, it only leads you away from your true path. You become permanently settled in pessimism and eventually you are crushed beneath it. To see the truth as it is...is to admit defeat. Yes, it is the very definition of defeatism, for it is its very genesis.