I read the article. (Can't sleep.) As long as we keep in mind that it's excerpted and adapted from a book, and that it has nothing to do with prepping -- not directly anyway -- it's not too disjointed or anything.

The article does confirm what I've observed. People who have been raised/trained to be positive and confident (with praise and positive reenforcement) can often crack when confronted with real adversity. On the other hand, people who have been raised with criticism and challenges tend to be more resilient. Their sense of self-worth is not tied to everything always going well, or the belief that things will turn out well. Things can go badly, and they are still who they are. Heck, mommy & daddy have been telling them they need to do a better job since day one, so what difference does it make that they're stranded in the desert? They'll just have to work their way out of this as usual. Whether they have a healthy sense of self-esteem is another thing. There was actually an article comparing American and Asian child rearing precisely on this point.

I think real confidence is built from conquering challenges, not from empty praise. Then, when disaster strikes, you have to remain equanimous and rational, so as to make the best survival decisions. This is just a guess, because I've fortunately never been in a real survival situation, but perhaps some people need to think positively, and others need to think negatively, in order to take a realistic look at the situation. The positive thinkers are prone to negative thoughts that amplify themselves, and the negative thinkers really need the vaccination of negative thinking to realize that things aren't so bad. So negative thinking leads to positive thinking.