Business Book Club: Flourish
I've set myself a goal to read one self-development book per month. To make sure I truly reflect on what I'm reading, I'm going to extract the wisdom from the best business and personal development books and share it with you.
This time, I've been reading Flourish by Martin Seligman
The Book
As you can guess, the book is all about what makes us Flourish. It raises the question of what happiness really is and if happiness is even the right thing to aim for. This book interested me because I've been a Strengthscope practitioner for a while now and I've been doing a lot of work around strengths philosophy and coaching. I was keen to know more about the positive psychology that sits behind the theory and as Martin Seligman is one of the founders of positive psychology, I was really keen to hear his perspective.
Can this book tell me what makes us happy and is it a useful tool for finding out what we can do to improve the quality of our lives?
What Did I Learn?
The search for happiness
Seligman starts by explaining that most psychology in the past has been about trying to cure unhappiness. He explains that getting rid of unhappiness isn't the same as working out what makes people happy. He also laments the fact that, all too often, attempts to address unhappiness focus on medication. He points out that anti-depressants provide only temporary relief and even then, they are only really effective for people with the most severe cases of depression. Of course, people with moderate or mild depression need help too. So what can we do to increase their happiness? Is there something that could be done to identify the elements that improve well-being and how can we help people develop those skills?
Martin Seligman's previous book, Authentic Happiness, did try to address the question of what makes us happy but looking back on it some years later he wasn't completely happy with it. In fact, he wasn't even happy with the title as he felt it had little to do with authenticity and that happiness probably wasn't the right word either. He much preferred ‘well-being’ because happiness usually describes pure positive emotion. He felt that had to be more to happiness than that. Seligman wanted something a little bit more concrete, something that could be proven with more scientific rigour.
The PERMA Model
Seligman lays out his criteria for what makes us happy in his PERMA model. He had three criteria that he applied to any element he identified as making people flourish:
It must increase your overall well-being. It can’t just be about feeling good.
It must be something that we are drawn towards or that we pursue for its own sake.
Each of the elements must be independent of the others.
Positive Emotion: Positive emotion isn't happiness in itself but it is an important aspect of our well-being. Positive emotion is about feeling good, a sense of joy, comfort, ecstasy and satisfaction with life generally. I suppose this could be the kind of thing you might describe when you get good dopamine hit.
Engagement: This is when you are in a state of flow. When you are just so absorbed or engaged by something that you lose track of time. Time stops and you lose yourself because you are doing something that is inherently interesting to you. It might be a demanding task that leaves you feeling exhausted (so this is different from pure positive emotion) but ultimately you walk away feeling satisfied.
Meaning: Put simply, a feeling of being part of something bigger than yourself. This is about having a sense of purpose. A sense that you are doing something of consequence.
Accomplishment: Something you pursue for its own sake. Not just achieving what you are expected or obligated to do, but what you personally are drawn to. This could be in the world of work and this is where many of us find our achievement, but it could equally be in the home, your hobbies or in your social life.
Positive relationships: Think about the last time you felt really happy or joyful. Chances are, at least one other person was with you. This is about building a solid set of relationships with those who you love and trust. Positive relationships have been shown to alleviate symptoms of depression and boost our wellbeing. Do you have someone in your life who you'd feel comfortable phoning at four in the morning if you needed to? If the answer is yes, then chances are, you have positive relationships and better well-being
PERMA in Action
Students
One of the more interesting ways in which Seligman applied this thinking is in a school in Australia. He did a series of exercises with the students to try and build their ability to flourish in all five of the PERMA areas.
He gave the students a gratitude journal. All they had to do was spend 10 minutes or so at the end of each day listing three things that made them happy or grateful. As they wrote these down they asked themselves why these good things happened. He found that students that did this exercise over a period of weeks were much much happier.
He also asked the students to think of a random act of kindness and to not just plan it but to carry it out as well.
Students were asked to write a letter to someone who has impacted their life or has influenced them in a positive way. Then, they were asked to send the letter.
The result of these exercises was that the students reported significantly fewer instances of feeling depressed and they had higher ambitions. Even better, the school as a whole had fewer conduct issues afterwards.
Impact on soldiers
Seligman has also applied these principles in the United States Army. As well as helping to make soldiers ready for combat by developing their emotional readiness for war zones, he also suggests that positive psychology has implications for those suffering PTSD. For people who have experienced trauma, flashbacks and sleeplessness are quite normal. This is the body's way of processing the aftermath of a traumatic situation. However, Seligman explains that suffering from Post Traumatic Stress isn't inevitable. Instead, he talks about Post Traumatic Growth. He describes instances where people have experienced trauma, but who actually develop some enhanced abilities or skills off the back of what they experienced. He feels that PTSD is over-diagnosed that maybe we should look a bit more into how we can help people grow from trauma, rather than just labelling them with PTSD.
Happiness as a measure of success?
What does this view of wellbeing mean for us as a society?
One of the most thought-provoking ideas in the book for me is the idea that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a poor measure of any society. At the moment, we measure how well a country is doing by looking at GDP. Of course, there was a time when the GDP was a valid measure. During the industrial revolution, when GDP shot up, standards of living went up and working conditions improved. These days, however, most people have their basic needs met so GDP is no longer a good measure of how well a country is progressing. Seligman suggests that measuring well-being is a better measure of a country's success than GDP.
There are many Latin countries that have a very low GDP but have very high levels of happiness. Conversely, there are many European countries with very high GDP but very low levels of happiness. If you look at the USA over the last 50 years, their GDP has tripled but they report no real increase in happiness levels among their citizens. Wealth can help you with the positive emotion part of wellbeing in the short term but it does absolutely nothing to affect the other elements of the PERMA approach to wellbeing. This begs the question, how do we measure the standard of living and the happiness of our citizens?
What Did I Think?
This was a really good insight into happiness or, perhaps I should say, well-being. Seligman gives us some good ideas about what it is that truly makes us flourish and it is reassuring to know that this is all backed up by scientific studies. I also enjoyed hearing about the beginnings of positive psychology although I was surprised to hear just how recent the idea of flourishing, as opposed to simply not being unhappy, is.
My one criticism would be that some parts of the book can be a little dry. A little bit too long is spent on Seligman's anecdotes about his career. Don't get me wrong, he has an impressive career and he has added a great deal to the field of psychology, but sometimes the personal anecdotes run a little dry. That said, it shouldn't put you off. There are some practical tools in the book too and he provides links to his website where you can find tools for measuring your strengths and other happiness tests you can do for yourself.
Overall I recommend that you read the book. I found it changed my approach to the way we think about well-being. There’s plenty to enjoy for any manager, worker or family member.
What should I read next?
Have you read Flourish? What did you get from it? What should I read next?
If you have any recommendations let me know below or via Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn
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