A Life Worth Living: Contributions to Positive PsychologyMihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Isabella Selega Csikszentmihalyi A Life Worth Living brings together the latest thought on Positive Psychology from an international cast of scholars. It includes historical, philosophical, and empirical reviews of what psychologists have found to matter for personal happiness and well-being. The contributions to this volume agree on priciples of optimal development that start from purely material and selfish concerns, but then lead to ever broader circles of responsibility embracing the goals of others and the well-being of the environment; on the importance of spirituality; on the development of strengths specific to the individual. Rather than material success, popularity, or power, the investigations reported in this volume suggest that personally constructed goals, intrinsic motivation, and a sense of autonomy are much more important. The chapters indicate that hardship and suffering do not necessarily make us unhappy, and they suggest therapeutical implications for improving the quality of life. Specific topics covered include the formation of optimal childhood values and habits as well as a new perspective on aging. This volume provides a powerful counterpoint to a mistakenly reductionist psychology. They show that subjective experience can be studied scientifically and measured accurately. They highlight the potentiality for autonomy and freedom that is among the most precious elements of the human condition. MOreover, they make a convincing case for the importance of subjective phenomena, which often affect happiness more than external, material conditions. After long decades during which psychologists seemed to have forgotten that misery is not the only option, the blossoming of Positive Psychology promises a better understanding of what a vigorous, meaningful life may consist of. |
Contents
3 | |
15 | |
Positive Experiences | 83 |
Lifelong Positive Development | 139 |
Author Index | 237 |
Subject Index | 247 |
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Common terms and phrases
accommodative action activities adolescents Alexithymia American Psychological Association approach assimilative associated Baltes behavior Brandtstädter broaden-and-build theory character strengths Classification clinical psychology cognitive concept coping correlated cross-cultural Csikszentmihalyi cultural depression developmental Diener disabilities disorders effects Emmons emotional intelligence Emotional Intelligence Test example Fave feelings focused Fredrickson function Gallup Organization happiness human important internal intrinsic Isen Journal of Personality Kasser levels life-span lives Martin Seligman Massimini Mayer meaning measures Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi motivation MSCEIT negative emotions Nurmi one’s optimal experience outcomes Pargament participants people’s personal development personal goals Personality and Social perspective Peterson positive affect positive emotions positive psychology problems processes psychological resilience psychology of religion psychotherapy relationship religion religious reported resilience role Rothermund Salmela-Aro Salovey sample self-determination self-determination theory self-report Seligman Sheldon situation Social Psychology spiritual strategies strivings subjective well-being suggest task theoretical therapy tion tive traits University Press York
Popular passages
Page 20 - Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do.
Page 98 - Testament taught this doctrine, and they believed it thoroughly because it corresponded with what they saw in their own lives and in the lives of those around them, both of sin and of the effects of Divine grace.
Page 33 - ... letting one's accomplishments speak for themselves; not seeking the spotlight; not regarding oneself as more special than one is • Prudence: being careful about one's choices; not taking undue risks; not saying or doing things that might later be regretted • Self-Regulation: regulating what one feels and does; being disciplined; controlling one's appetites and emotions 6.
Page 117 - Goldman, SL, Kraemer, DT, & Salovey, P. (1996). Beliefs about mood moderate the relationship of stress to illness and symptom reporting.
Page 105 - The core capacity at work here is access to one's own feeling life — one's range of affects or emotions: the capacity instantly to effect discriminations among...
Page 117 - MA, & Mayer, JD (2003). Convergent, discriminant, and incremental validity of competing measures of emotional intelligence. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 29, 1147-1158. Brackett, MA, Mayer, JD, & Warner, RM (2004). Emotional intelligence and its relation to everyday behavior.
Page 67 - Piedmont, spiritual transcendence is "the capacity of individuals to stand outside of their immediate sense of time and place and to view life from a larger, more objective perspective. This transcendent perspective is one in which a person sees a fundamental unity underlying the diverse strivings of nature
Page 64 - breath of life," is a way of being and experiencing that comes about through awareness of a transcendent dimension and that is characterized by certain identifiable values in regard to self, others, nature, life, and whatever one considers to be the Ultimate, (p.
Page 32 - Finishing what one starts; persisting in a course of action in spite of obstacles; "getting it out the door"; taking pleasure in completing tasks...
References to this book
Handbook of Emotions, Third Edition Michael Lewis,Jeannette M. Haviland-Jones,Lisa Feldman Barrett Limited preview - 2008 |