Word: shahar
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...like something entirely new, poised to provide innovative answers to the really big questions. With its fusion of self-help and brain science, it was perfectly calculated to appeal to soul-searching undergrads desirous of something a touch more quantitative than Nietzsche. A lecture course taught by Tal Ben-Shahar on “how to get happy” quickly became the most popular class at Harvard, with students carefully copying down chestnuts like “Give yourself permission to be human” from the blackboard. Over 200 similarly themed courses likewise sprouted up in universities across...
...Optimalist" Most people would define optimism as being eternally hopeful, endlessly happy, with a glass that's perpetually half full. But that's exactly the kind of deluded cheerfulness that positive psychologists wouldn't recommend. "Healthy optimism means being in touch with reality," says Tal Ben-Shahar, a Harvard professor who taught the university's most popular course, Positive Psychology, from 2002 to 2008. "It certainly doesn't mean being Pollyannaish and thinking everything is great and wonderful...
...Shahar, who is the author of Happier (2007) and a new book, The Pursuit of Perfect (April 2009), describes realistic optimists as "optimalists" - not those who believe everything happens for the best, but those who make the best of things that happen...
...life, Ben-Shahar uses three optimalist exercises, which he calls PRP. When he feels down - say, after giving a bad lecture - he grants himself permission (P) to be human. He reminds himself that not every lecture can be a Nobel winner; some will be less effective than others. Next is reconstruction (R). He parses the weak lecture, learning lessons for the future about what works and what doesn't. Finally, there's perspective (P), which involves acknowledging that in the grand scheme of life, one lecture really doesn't matter...
...That's what prompted him to launch the field of positive psychology, with a groundbreaking address to the American Psychological Association in 1998. Instead of focusing only on righting wrongs and lifting misery, he argued, psychologists need to help patients foster good mental health through constructive skills, like Ben-Shahar's PRP. The idea is to teach patients to strengthen their strengths rather than simply improve their weaknesses. "It's not enough to clear away the weeds and underbrush," Seligman says. "If you want roses, you have to plant a rose...