SYSTEMIC COACH
EXECUTIVE ADVISOR
DEEP DIVE
Positive Psychology – the science at the core of coaching
Positive Psychology is a fundamental element of my approach.
Making a deep dive into past, present and future of this branch of science, about relevant researchers and key scientific leaps would be highly interesting, but too much for this section. We will have the opportunity to speak about it and you’ll experience the effects of respective interventions during our work.
At this point, I provide you a more detailed and a short description to begin with.
More detailed
One milestone in the emergence of Positive Psychology was Martin E.P. Seligman’s inaugural address to the members of the American Psychological Association (APA) in 1998. As the new APA president, Marty made clear that for decades, psychology had been primarily focused on healing psychopathology, losing sight of what truly constitutes a meaningful, content and fulfilling life. The field of psychology had become overly fixated on the human psychopathology and required a new branch of science and a renewed scientifically supported understanding of humanity. Seligman's speech is regarded as a pivotal moment in the dissemination of Positive Psychology.
Rooted in rigorous research and empirical evidence, Positive Psychology is a branch of science of academic psychology, giving answers to the question what makes a life worth living and humans flourish. It is the science at the heart of coaching.
Being open to the full range of human being, Positive Psychology does not negate misery nor the necessity of psychological suffering needing diagnose and treatment. Positive Psychology strives for an integrated perspective, focusing on a positive development trend, thereby not only addressing people diagnosed psychological strain, but everyone.
Rather than merely fixing what is wrong with people, Positive Psychology shines a light on what is strong and can be enhanced in the human condition.
Concepts, methods and interventions provided are manifold as more and more fields of research are explored (i.a. positive education, constructive journalism, positive neuroscience, positive health, prosocial behavior and altruism). Methods raise personal responsibility, facilitate experiencing and building self-efficacy and they foster and lift self-actualization.
One more important aspect is the work on full mental capacity in the sense of optimal mental performance. And this work can be fun.
It is about the holistic and personally meaningful utilization of one's own potential. Building new internal resources and being enabled to access them on point moreover is a set of protective factors available when loads of any kind like stress, anxiety or burnout emerge.
A definition
„Positive Psychology is the call for psychological research and practice to be equally concerned with human strengths as with weaknesses, equally interested in enhancing the best in life as in overcoming the worst, and equally dedicated to improving the quality of life for healthy individuals as to healing psychopathology.“
In it's most basic sense, the positive in Positive Psychology is pretty easy to understand. It refers to what we want, for ourselves and the world we live in. To feel good, have close relationships with family and friends. We want to use our unique abilities in ways that help us succeed and we want our lives to have meaning.
Positive Psychology uses scientific methods to study such topics to understand what makes us flourish and to identify concrete steps we can take to increase our contentment and well-being.
It is based on the fundamental insight that treating mental illness is not the same thing as promoting mental health. Getting rid of what we don't want in our lives does not automatically bring what we do want (growth orientation). It's not just the absence of the negative. It refers to things we value like joy, serenity, courage, optimism, altruism, peace, perseverance and love.
And these things don't automatically come by fighting against sadness, anxiety, fear, selfishness, boredom and hatred. - They have to be cultivated and nurtured.
Short
Thinking about gardening - a famous example used by Martin Seligman - having pulled weeds out of the garden, you also have to plant flowers to end up with more than a field of dirt. Got it?