My thoughts on Positive Psychology Mrs Linda Chiba Deputy Principal Presbyterian Ladies College Croydon. Good mental health of students is in the interest of all educators. There is a strong research base that indicates that positive mental health outcomes are linked to positive academic achievement. That is why you are all here. We want our students to be in a good place and overall the mental health of our students is pretty good. 80% to 85% of our young people are healthy and happy. But I imagine that another reason why you are here is because you can no longer ignore the mental health issues of the students that are in your care every day. Unfortunately there is a growing pointy end where the statistics are not so good. Here is a snapshot: Mental ill health is the number one health issue facing young people in Australia Mental disorders are more prevalent for young people aged 16-24 than any other age group, and affects 26 per cent of young Australians. Anxiety and depression are the most common mental health problems for young people. Anxiety disorders are estimated to affect about one in every 10 young person aged 18-24 years. Twelve per cent of 13-17 year olds have reported having thoughts about suicide, while 4.2% had actually made a suicide attempt. Females have a higher rate of suicidal ideation than males. Anecdotally at least I too have seen a growing number of students who are presenting at school with sub-clinical levels of anxiety, sadness, and general low mood. Students are disclosing thoughts of suicide and some I know have attempted to do so. Self harm is all too prevalent. We, in the area of pastoral care are trying to do a good job of caring for these students; we feel empathy for them, we put provisions in place for them, we pray for them, we refer them to the school counsellor or psychologist and we counsel and comfort the parents. But sometimes it feels as if we are simply waiting and for the next poor student to present at our door with the same concerns! So too often we are the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff ready to do the mop up and triage.
But there has to be a better way. We need to do a better job. We need to be proactive and help build the protective wall around our students before the dam walls burst and the emotional torrents to follow come flooding down. My interest in positive psychology has grown out of what I believe is my responsibility as a Christian educator to prevent the students in my care becoming one of these statistics I have mentioned. I graduated from Sydney University with a major in psychology- this was in the early 1980s during a time when Behaviouralism was the major psychology theory taught and researched. Behaviourist were only concerned with observable behaviour. In order for psychology to have any legitimacy within the body of science it could only deal with behaviour that could be predicted and observed. This was to counter the unscientific approach of the psychoanalysts who had dominated psychology in the 60s and 70s. According to Behavourist theory we react in response to the stimulus presented to us. One s behaviour can be modified by an external other who can manipulate the reward and stimulus presented. It was the environment that determines behaviour. But the question of why people responded to events in the way they did always fascinated me. Why are some people able to not only withstand but also thrive in the face of the emotional toil of life while others seem to succumb quickly and find it difficult to recover from setbacks? You may remember the wonderful pioneering work of Toni Noble and her Bounce Back programme - Bounce Back was actually based on the early work of Martin Seligman in the 1990s on Learnt Optimism. That is, people who are resilient and who do bounce back after a setback perceives their setbacks as temporal, changeable and local. While those who are less resilient perceive their setbacks as permanent, unchangeable and pervasive. Seligman argued that we could learn the skills of optimism by challenging the way we think. There was a growing understanding in educational psychology that the mind matters! In fact one resource that started the whole journey for me was the first Mindmatters resources produced by the federal government in the early 2000. Which was and still is a fantastic resource to help build resilience in young people. I first came across positive psychology in about 2006. Martin Seligman s book Authentic Happiness was published in 2002 I think. He proposed that there were 3 dimensions to happiness- the pleasant life the good life and the meaningful life. Without really exploring the notion at that time I simply rejected it as a happiness psychology- how to be happy all the time
I felt that it was superficial, hedonistic, unrealistic and against what I knew about human life and suffering. I felt that it preached false hope, because we know that in this life we will suffer and we will be sad and we will be broken. Telling people to be happy and positive just won t work. It didn t t fit into my Christian worldview. Interestingly Seligman now regrets using the word happiness at all in his first attempts at explaining his psychological theory. He totally rejects the idea of a happiology and the movements that have arisen in response. In about 2010 I revisited positive psychology again by which time Seligman had adjusted his theory considerably. He was no longer talking about a Happiness Theory. He was talking about a theory of wellbeing and flourishing. He was talking about prevention rather than cure. He was talking about people in terms of their strengths rather than their weaknesses. He was talking about an asset model of psychology rather than a deficit model of psychology. He now outlined what he described as the pillars to well-being. He calls this the PERMA model: Positive Emotion, Engagement. Relationships, Meaning and Accomplishment with an underpinning of the development of character strengths. For me this new model fitted with what I knew of God and my relationship with Him. He sees my weaknesses yet he still loves me. In fact He loves me despite my weaknesses. He does not point out every negative about me. He tells me I am fearfully and wonderfully made. He tells me that He loves me- as I am. He tells me to come to Him just as I am. He tells me he has given me gifts that I need to use. I have gifts!! I have strengths - to use for his glory Because of what Jesus has done for me I am asset rich- not deficit poor! Seligman also included an area in his theory that he had totally ignored in his first iteration- that is, he was emphasising the importance of cultivating positive relationships. It has been my observation and probably yours as well that it is really broken relationships which are at the core of many of the problems we see in our schools today. We don t do relationships well! I believe that if we can teach practical skills to improve the quality of relationships then we have a good shot at improving the mental health of young people.
We are made to be in relationship. Firstly to be in relationship with God and then with others. Having quality relationships with those around us and with God is what will truly bring us quality well-being and a flourishing life. When our relationships are broken- we are broken. Positive Psychology focuses on the importance of building good relationships. More importantly Positive Psychology provides practical skills and practices to improve our relationships; Things like learning to share in others good news, understanding other s perspectives, listening in the moment, practising gratitude, practicing savouring practicing forgiveness and all the while drawing on your character strengths to do this. Further, Seligman now concluded that good well-being, that is a flourishing life, entails living for something or someone greater than oneself. He believed that it was this dimension of life- living a meaningful life, which has the largest impact on our well being, whether in the cause of others or of an ideal. Positive Psychology at its core is a self transcendent psychology. This is completely consistent with the message of the bible- in order to find our true selves and our identity in Christ we must lose ourselves in our service to God and to others around us. And finally Seligman was now including in his PERMA model a sense of accomplishment as being a pillar of wellbeing. Although this may not have any strong Christian underpinning, we intuitively know as educators that a sense of accomplishment is vital in encouraging students to keep on persevering -reaching the goals that students have set for themselves is an important aspect of growing as a learner. For me, the more I read about Positive Psychology and understood and apply the concepts to my own life, the more I realised that using our mind well is at the core of Positive Psychology. We are not at the whim of those around us or our environment as the behaviouralist would have had us think. We can control our thoughts and if we can control our thoughts then we can decide how to respond to people and circumstances. This is central to what the bible tells us to do as Christians. God has given us a mind. We have been given the ability to make choices. As Christians we choose every day to take up our cross and follow Jesus, we can choose to clothe our in compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
We can choose what to think and what to dwell on. In fact the bible tells us to take captive all our thoughts and make them obedient to Christ (Corinthians 10:5). There are other verses following a similar theme. Romans 12:2 tells us that we must be transformed by the renewing of our mind. Ephesians 4:24 tells us that we are to be made new in the attitude of our minds Philippians 4:8 tells us that we are to think about things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, and praiseworthy. We may not always have control over the circumstances that we find ourselves in nor do we have control over the behaviour of others around us but God has given us a mind which allows us to decide HOW we will respond to these circumstances. This is the true essence of positive psychology. It is about self control and self regulation. We must cultivate our minds. The science of Neuroplasticity confirms this. We now know that neural pathways and synapses can change and grow as a result of new thoughts, new behaviours and new emotions. Our brain development is not fixed. With practice and self discipline, perseverance and training we can take captive our thoughts. We can transform our minds. We do not need to stay in the state of negativity or anxiety or stress. We are not helpless. We can be active participants in this process. And along the way improve our wellbeing. This quote from Charles R Swindoll encapsulates the philosophical underpinnings of what positive psychology has to offer: The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life... I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes. But what about suffering? How can positive psychology speak to suffering? We know that in this life there will be trouble and suffering. There is sorrow and pain. How can positive psychology simply tell us to think positively or be simply optimistic when we are experiencing deep, deep pain? Well, I think there is no way of escaping suffering - and we should weep with those who weep. I also believe that in order to experience joy one must be prepared to experience pain too. Victor Frankl s book Man s Search for Meaning describes his life in a Nazi concentration camp. He lost all of his family and experienced unimaginable suffering. Yet he remained hopeful. I think he is amazing advocate for Positive Psychology. He is a testament to the power of the mind and of the power of attitude.
Frankl talks about the importance of cultivating an attitude of acceptance towards circumstance that you can t change or have control over- something similar is expressed in the Serenity prayer God give me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. He talks about the importance of affirming the inherent value and meaning in human existence in the face of suffering. He talks about self transcendence and the importance of looking beyond oneself to others in the face of suffering. He talks about the importance of striving for achievement in the face of suffering and finally he talks about courage to face adversity in suffering. Acceptance, affirmation, courage, and self transcendence and faith are a mature and complex approach to suffering - one that is not trying to ignore or eradicate bad or negative experiences but in fact acknowledge them, embrace them and learn to live and grow through them. This too I believe is at the very heart of the bible message. Hope in the face of suffering... and positive psychology is giving us the skills to do so. Finally there still remains an element in this positive psychology model which probably does not sit well with some Christians. This is the idea that positive emotions and engagement are an essential ingredient to positive well being. The Christian concern is that the pursuit of positive emotions and experiences could result in the individualistic and hedonistic pursuit of gratification without consideration for others and God. For Christians, this is the element of positive psychology that is the hardest to grapple with and can be prone to misinterpretation. Some would say that positive psychology simply focusses on making yourself feel good which is a reworking of the epicurean idea of pleasure as the greatest good. I have a few comments to make in response to this. I believe that The God of creation delights in his people. He delights in our creation. (Psalm 149:4) His creation is for us to enjoy -everything in it! And he has created this world for all people to flourish. How can anyone look at new born baby, or a breathtaking sunset or a spectacular mountain range and not be filled with positive emotion. How can you listen to Handel s Messiah and not be filled with complete joy and be completed transformed by the experience! God wants us to have and experience positive emotion We are to be joyful - we should take pleasure in the things that are good for us that have been ordained by God. The psalms are full of rejoicing! Paul tells us to rejoice and then again rejoice! And I guess this is the key- as Christians we need to take pleasure in the things that God has ordained to be good for us. He knows the best way for us to flourish! That is why it is important to teach Positive Psychology in Christian and Church based
schools. We can tell our students and model to them that complete Joy is found in the Lord. Who else will do that? At PLC Sydney we have created our version and interpretation of the Positive Psychology PERMA model. We do not believe that positive well being is a goal to be achieved. Rather we believe that positive well being - a flourishing life will grow out of living a purposeful, authentic and joyful life that seeks a deep connection and personal relationship with others, creation and God. We encourage our students to always be their best or better selves. We dialogue in our Home Room, in Chapel and Year meetings around what this might look like and we have identified key elements to how this might be achieved: They are Knowing, understanding and transforming our thoughts, emotions and actions Caring for our physical body Valuing and cultivating relationships Connecting and belonging to our community Focusing on self transcendency through service to others Developing a global understanding of our responsibility as wise stewards Cultivating authenticity Understanding and applying our learning virtues and Character strengths Striving for self efficacy Experiencing joy and wonder We do this in a community of Grace through acknowledging God s unconditional love for us. We are blessed with beautiful gardens at PLC. And the garden is a good metaphor for our minds. Just as a garden will either be overgrown or simply wither without care and cultivation so will our minds. It takes effort to cultivate a beautiful garden and it takes effort to cultivate our minds. We need to prune away what is unhelpful and grow and feed that which is helpful to us and others. I believe Positive Psychology offers the tool set which will help our students live a purposeful, authentic and joyful life which, in time and in God s strength, will not only guard and protect them from mental ill health but ultimately help them flourish.