Publisher's acknowledgements
1 What is brilliant about positive psychology
Background and history
How positive psychology as an idea came to be
The terms of happiness
How to measure happiness and well-being
What the research says
Nothing is in isolation
The power of choice
2 Happiness and psychological well-being
Two ways to be happy
The happiness formula
Happiness and sorrow
Happiness as a measure of psychological well-being
Psychological well-being
How strong are the foundations of your psychological well-being?
Happiness and time
Happiness and choice
3 How to build positive feelings and become happier
The importance of positive emotions
Positive emotion as a positive resource
Building positive feelings: how to increase lasting positive emotion
Finding flow
Becoming present
How to become more present
Feeling good in and beyond the present moment lasting pleasure
4 Do more of what you love and set better goals
Do you get up in the morning excited about the day?
Natural talent
Being authentic
Remembering flow
Finding your strengths
Using strengths to express values
What do we mean by values?
Three important points to remember about using your strengths
Goals
Uncertainty
Hope
Positive thinking is better thinking
Positive steps to achieving your goals
Past experiences and their influence on your goals
Is action in conflict with your values?
Goals and fear
Improving self-efficacy or self-belief
5 Emotional well-being: building better relationships with ourselves and others
Emotional control
Emotional intelligence
Catching your feelings
Putting emotional intelligence to work
Building a positive relationship with your romantic partner
Putting positive psychology to work with your partner and all close relationships
Self-regard, your relationship with yourself
6 How to become more resilient and cope better
What is resilience?
What makes a resilient person?
The role of perception
Attributional and explanatory style
Taming the gremlin
Building an optimistic explanatory style
The power of optimism
Coping optimistically and building your resilience
Emotional coping strategies
7 Find out what matters: having purpose in your life
Why do we need meaning/purpose?
How to find meaning
Values that identify us socially and culturally
Finding what we need and value is just the beginning!
Create a mission statement
Living authentically
Telos
Money and fame
The cost of materialistic values
8 Getting wise: developing your spiritual well-being
Wisdom
Developing your spirituality
p; The advantages of religious belief and practice
Spiritual practices that support well-being
Mindfulness
Meditation
9 Positive health: how to build physical well-being and live longer
Physical well-being
Having fun and getting healthy
How to develop healthy habits
10 Putting positive psychology to work at work
Positive psychology applied to performance and achievement
Positive psychology applied to business relationships
Positive psychology and meaningful work
Transformational leadership
Happiness at work
Afterword
Choice
Complexity
Creativity
List of values
Useful bibliography
References
Index
