Understanding Happiness
"Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence."
- Aristotle
In my post Lifelong Learning, I introduced a wonderful course offered on iTunes U called Understanding Happiness. This course is actually a compilation of 7 different TED talks. The first talk was the one I discussed in my previous post, Paying Attention to Happiness, in which Nancy Etcoff explores the Surprising Science of Happiness.The second talk in this course is by the "father" of Positive Psychology, Martin Seligman. His talk, On Positive Psychology, is informative and engaging and very well worth the 20 minutes of time for anyone even slightly interested in this field. He gives the history, the science and the reasoning behind the field. He points out three key points. Positive Psychology is:
- As concerned with strengths as it is with weaknesses
- As interested in building the best as in repairing the worst
- As concerned with making the lives of normal people fulfilling and nurtuiring talent as with healing
Note, it does not say "just be happy." It does not say that it is not concerned with healing, just that it is just as concerned with nurturing the positive as it is with healing; it does not say ignore one's weaknesses, it is just also concerned with finding strengths. As I suggested in Moving Toward Authentic Self
In order to make changes in the present and not stay stuck, we have to look at the past and understand what led us to our current situation. We need to work through and move through our feelings of pain and loss in order to move on. Please understand I am absolutely and positively a believer in Positive Psychology and finding happiness. But it must be Authentic Happiness. And in my opinion Authentic Happiness can only be obtained when we have done our work and touched our Authentic Self.
For those of you interested in learning more and even taking a free test to assess your own level of Authentic Happiness, you can go to Authentic Happiness.
So for those of you that believe that Positive Psychology is the science of just be happy and get on with it, I hope you will take the time to listen to Dr. Seligman's informative and interesting talk linked below. It goes a long way in helping us in Understanding Happiness.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndkCCCjU8Y8]
Please let me know your thoughts Martin Seligman’s TED talk at iTunes U, and I’d love to hear about what you think about Positive Psychology.And as always thank you for taking the time to visit, I appreciate it.