A crucial step towards healthy self-growth.
You are the people you surround yourself with, the music you listen to, and the books you enjoy — has someone ever told you that? It sounds pretty cliché, but it’s somewhat true. Our surroundings can affect our actions and emotions. Even more, the environment can dictate the way we will respond to certain situations. Often, when we feel distressed, we listen to sad songs, or we watch shows that only provoke worse feelings. Could exercises to counter negative emotions have a positive impact on the individual? To answer that interrogative, psychology is studying how positive interventions can influence individuals who are facing mental health conditions such as depression or anxiety. This field is called positive psychology.
Is it effective?
According to Peterson (2008), positive psychology is a scientific approach to studying human thoughts, feelings, and behavior; it focuses on strengths instead of weaknesses. In an individual, positive psychology works on using positive attitudes to target negative ones. A study conducted in Hong Kong, China, by Kwok, Gu, and Tong Kai Kit, used positive psychology interventions in a sample of primary school students (aged 9–11). In total, 34 children were randomly assigned to the experimental condition and 34 children into a control condition. For the experimental group, they offered an eight-session intervention of hope and gratitude (in a group format). The group met once a week after their class schedules; each session lasted for around 90 minutes.
The intervention program, ‘‘Live a Positive Life,’’ aimed to enhance hope and gratitude in children in order to reduce their depressive symptoms and increase their life satisfaction. The program integrated key elements from hope and gratitude intervention and incorporated play and group work strategies with the children. Specifically, the intervention program emphasized training goal-setting skills, cultivating a sense of agency, facilitating the design of different pathways to achieve the goal, promoting self-gratitude, and acknowledging and encouraging the expression of gratitude to others. Depressive symptoms decreased in the experimental group while slightly increased in the control group over the course of the study. The findings of the study suggested that the intervention enhanced human strengths of hope and gratitude, which contributed to a consequent decrease in depressive symptoms and an increase in life satisfaction. This study shows that with a positive attitude you can overshadow the negative ones.
How can it be applied to a daily routine?
Positive psychology can be applied to our everyday lives. Its effectiveness depends merely on how you work on it and how often you put it into practice. This way of living has to be seen more like an exercise that, if done continuously, will be beneficial in all aspects of your life. Positive psychology depends on habits. The way you speak to yourself and about yourself, the people you surround yourself with, which outsiders’ opinions you take into consideration, the music and programs you listen to, the books you enjoy, and the places you visit, these everyday things can have a tremendous impact on the self.
If you want to integrate positive psychology into your lifestyle, make yourself a priority. It will help you change your life for the better. Making yourself a priority is the hardest yet most important step when it comes to self-love, and also the first step that an individual has to take to grow individually. Once you take that step, practice positive habits, start small, be consistent, you will notice significant changes in yourself.
What should you take into consideration when thinking about implementing positive psychology to your day-to-day? What are some tips?
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Remember that Positive Psychology is an exercise.
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Make it a part of your routine. Leave positive and encouraging messages on your desk, your phone, or your mirror. Change the music you listen to music that motivates and inspires you. Be careful with the things and the influencers you look up to on social media, the lives full of perfection that they portray can affect the perspective you have towards yourself. Remember that social media is not real.
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Accept and face your situation. If the big picture or certain situations overwhelm you, try to look first at the things that you can manage and work with the ones you can solve in the short term. The key is to be persistent and consistent.
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Practice having a positive attitude towards situations that can affect you negatively. Ask yourself the question: Will the way I react to this scenario benefit me?
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Practice gratitude and love towards yourself and the people that surround you.
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Are the things you spend most of your time on good for you? Do they contribute to your growth?
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How are the conversations you have with others and with yourself, are they negative? You will be with yourself during all your lifespan, so make peace with yourself and love yourself first. Be respectful of yourself always. Just like that, you will be able to love others healthily.
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In what type of environment do you reside? Always be aware of it since it can affect the way you respond to situations.
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Take into consideration your physical health. The things you eat, your sleeping habits, and physical fitness influence your mental health and your well-being in a big way. Remember that a healthy body contributes to a healthy mind, and a healthy mind contributes to a healthy body.
Is Positive Psychology life-changing?
Researchers state that optimism may correlate with cardiovascular health and may even decrease the rate of the disease’s progression. Additionally, physical health can be associated with a person’s mental health. Having healthy habits, such as exercising, can have a positive effect on an individual’s mental health. Research has shown that psychological health assets, such as positive emotions, life satisfaction, optimism, life purpose, social support, are associated with good health. Evidence is accumulating that a happy, engaged, and fulfilling psychological and social life is not just a consequence of good health; it is what leads people to live a healthy and long life.
Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. – World Health Organization