In Smart Love we find the following observation. All babies are born optimists. They naturally expect the best will happen for them. In fact, whatever happens for them, they feel that experience is the best the world has to offer. It is the way things are meant to be. In other words, the baby arrives set to begin becoming a self by creating a spontaneous, unconscious, and permanently unquestioned meaning perspective about how the world is meant to work and how the self works with it.
A baby cries. If the child lives in a fortunate world, the cry will find a response, and the baby's needs will be met by her/his caregiver. The baby understands that the first cry worked, so when the need arises once again, the baby cries again. Once again the cry finds an answer, a need fulfilling response. This is really great stuff. Eventually, as many mothers told me, and I experienced some myself, babies express different cries for different needs. The main point here is that the baby's needs get fulfilled as much as humanly possible by the caregiver or caregivers. According to Smart Love that consistent fulfillment allows the baby to develop inner happiness.
When a baby holds the feeling and notion of inner happiness, it carries a very special meaning. It gives the universe around that child a very special form. The universe becomes a place where feeling good, feeling happy, is how the world works. It's simply built that way. When things don't go well, the child assumes that things will get back in order soon, and the child can deal with the temporary dislocation of needs and their response. The child feels it's natural when things go well and accepts with some equanimity when they don't knowing that a positive change will come. According to the authors, this attitude, meaning perspective in our terms, will last for a lifetime. Some students wondered if that sort of meaning perspective would make such a child, and adult, far too vulnerable to the bad things that are bound to come in life. When things get tough, these folks might crumble under the weight of hard times. The authors suggest the contrary. In their experience, sixty years between them, and in studies they cite, those with inner happiness show greater resiliency than others. They show strength in the face of adversity. They get through bad news because their orientation, their meaning perspective tells them that good news is coming, no matter how delayed. They can and do endure. They feel that others feel unconditional positive regard for them, unconditional love. They feel the warmth of the caregiver, and that makes the world a warmer place.
Those babies who do not get their needs consistently met develop inner unhappiness. That comes as a mirror image of inner happiness. Everything stays in the same place but reversed and still mirrored. These babies and children feel that happiness is feeling bad, deprived, a place where needs are often not met. The child feels uncomfortable when things go well because it means the world, in the form of their meaning perspective, is out of shape. They feel that feeling bad is their happiest state. Feeling good is temporary and dangerous. The attitude, this meaning perspective also lasts a lifetime. They feel that others offer, at best, conditional positive regard, conditional love. The world is cold and remains cold for a lifetime.[10]