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Speaker 1: Pushkin. I always try to book guests for the show

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Speaker 1: that I know you'll love, people who I think really

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Speaker 1: have something to say about the science of happiness. Some

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Speaker 1: guests have important lived experiences, giving them valuable well being

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Speaker 1: insights to share. Other guests are leading researchers in my field,

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Speaker 1: people who've gathered exciting data about what actually does make

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Speaker 1: us feel happier. Let's go at zoom. I think the

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Speaker 1: zoom is sounding fine, so I think we should be

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Speaker 1: all set okay, But the guest you're about to hear

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Speaker 1: from today is kind of in a different league. Thank

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Speaker 1: you so much for taking the time to do this.

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Speaker 1: We've wanted to have you on the podcast for a

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Speaker 1: long time, so we're very.

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Speaker 2: Excited, happy to do it.

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Speaker 1: And saying he's in a different league honestly still sort

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Speaker 1: of under sells his stature, because this scientist didn't just

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Speaker 1: play the happiness scientist game, he kind of invented it.

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Speaker 1: I kind of just wanted to enter all the listeners

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Speaker 1: of the podcast to your story and what it's been

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Speaker 1: like to have this legacy of creating positive psychology over

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Speaker 1: these years. So we're going to kind of go pretty broad.

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Speaker 1: If you're cool with that.

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Speaker 2: Okay, Are we ready?

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Speaker 1: Yep, We're ready to go. Are you ready ready to

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Speaker 1: meet the scientist without whom the Happiness Lab probably wouldn't exist.

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Speaker 2: Hello, I'm Marty Seligman. I'm professor of psychology at the

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Speaker 2: University of Pennsylvania, and about twenty five years ago, when

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Speaker 2: I was president of the American Psychological Association, I had

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Speaker 2: to look around and ask what did psychology need? And

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Speaker 2: that was the origin story of positive psychology. Psychology have

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Speaker 2: been all about misery and suffering, and what it was

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Speaker 2: missing was the possibility that people could have a good life.

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Speaker 1: Marty Seligman's academic career stretches back decades, and he did

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Speaker 1: do plenty of important research into misery and suffering. He's

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Speaker 1: the researcher behind a famous experiment that we've talked about before,

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Speaker 1: the Happiness Lab. In his study, a group of dogs

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Speaker 1: were given mild electric shocks. Some of the dogs could

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Speaker 1: press a button to end their pain, but others could

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Speaker 1: do nothing to halt the shocks. When that unlucky's second

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Speaker 1: group was finally given an easy way to escape new shocks,

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Speaker 1: they never learned how to improve their situation. They simply

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Speaker 1: gave up and took the pain humans, it turns out

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Speaker 1: act just the same. It was an intriguing pattern of

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Speaker 1: results that Seligman famously christened learned helplessness. This research alone

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Speaker 1: would be achievement enough for most scientists, but Marty took

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Speaker 1: his work in a unique direction. He didn't just concentrate

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Speaker 1: on what could break our spirits and cause us misery.

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Speaker 1: He wanted to unlock the opposite, what could allow us

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Speaker 1: to become more resilient and flourish. In doing so, he

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Speaker 1: laid the foundation for the scientific study of happiness and

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Speaker 1: the whole field of research that we cover on this podcast,

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Speaker 1: a field known as positive psychology. And since Marty's the

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Speaker 1: guy who invented positive psychology, I thought it'd be fitting

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Speaker 1: to let him explain what it is.

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Speaker 2: I'm not big on definitions, but the way I think

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Speaker 2: about the subject matter is with the acronym perma eer

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Speaker 2: m A. These are the five things that I think

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Speaker 2: positive psychologists measure and build. So P is positive emotion,

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Speaker 2: subjective wellbeing, happiness, rapture, contentment E is engagement slow when

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Speaker 2: time stops for you, when you're one with the music,

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Speaker 2: when you're completely engaged. R is good relationships, M I've

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Speaker 2: changed my mind about recently. M is usually construed as meaning,

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Speaker 2: where meaning is something like belonging to and serving something

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Speaker 2: you think is bigger than you are. But I've come

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Speaker 2: to believe that there's a different m of mattering, which

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Speaker 2: is more at the heart of well being. How much

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Speaker 2: do you matter? What would happen if you vanished? How

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Speaker 2: much would you be missed? How much would your family

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Speaker 2: suffer if you vanished? How much would your work suffer?

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Speaker 2: And A is accomplishment, mastery, competence, achievement. So for me,

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Speaker 2: the definition of positive psychology, while open ended, revolves around

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Speaker 2: measuring and building.

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Speaker 1: Program So in some ways, it's kind of odd, one

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Speaker 1: might think, looking at the big history to realize that

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Speaker 1: you're focused on all these things that built Perma, because

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Speaker 1: at least at the beginning of your career, you were

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Speaker 1: known for studying something completely different. You were known for

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Speaker 1: studying maybe the opposite of Perma, right, which is the

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Speaker 1: sense of helplessness and animals, And so going way back,

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Speaker 1: I'm kind of curious how you got involved in that.

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Speaker 1: What started off your interest in kind of studying learn

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Speaker 1: helplessness and depression in animals? Where did that come from?

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Speaker 2: Well, In fact, I think in retrospect what I always

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Speaker 2: wanted to study was well being and happiness. But in

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Speaker 2: the nineteen sixties, when I entered psychology, before you were born, Laurie,

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Speaker 2: the only game in town that was even close to

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Speaker 2: it was misery and suffering in clinical psychology. And so

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Speaker 2: when I entered psychology as an undergraduate, I wanted to

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Speaker 2: do rigorous work, scientifically replicable, and the only thing around

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Speaker 2: was to work on misery. And so I was fortunate

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Speaker 2: enough to be part of a group in the early

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Speaker 2: nineteen sixties that discovered a phenomenon called learned helplessness. We

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Speaker 2: found that animals and then people who experienced events that

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Speaker 2: they couldn't do anything about collapsed and showed a set

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Speaker 2: of deficits very much like depression. And that's where I began,

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Speaker 2: and I worked on that for about fifteen years until

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Speaker 2: it became an established field. So that was the first

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Speaker 2: fifteen years of my fifty five year academic career.

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Speaker 1: So in some ways I've heard you talk before about

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Speaker 1: how you would studied well being if it was a career.

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Speaker 1: Were you sort of a happy kid and did that

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Speaker 1: continue into your professor years or did you resonate more

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Speaker 1: with some of those helpless animals that you were looking at.

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Speaker 2: Oh, I was a pretty unhappy, miserable kid. That didn't

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Speaker 2: make me want to study misery. It actually made me

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Speaker 2: want to study happiness. But no one was working on happiness.

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Speaker 2: And the way learned helplessness gave way to happiness and

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Speaker 2: positive psychology. And it was when we did helplessness experiments

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Speaker 2: with people. We found that only two thirds of the

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Speaker 2: people and two thirds of the animals who got bad

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Speaker 2: events that they couldn't do anything about collapsed and showed helplessness.

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Speaker 2: But really interestingly, one third of the people I worked

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Speaker 2: with I could not make helpless And finally, after about

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Speaker 2: ten to fifteen years, I said, these are really interesting people.

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Speaker 2: What is it about them that makes them immune from helplessness?

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Speaker 2: And that led to the next fifteen years of my work,

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Speaker 2: which basically that it was optimistic people, optimism and pessimism.

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Speaker 2: In my way of thinking, means the following. Pessimistic people

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Speaker 2: are people who, when bad events strike them, believe it's permanent,

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Speaker 2: it's going to last forever, it's pervasive, it's going to

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Speaker 2: ruin your whole life, and it's uncontrollable. Nothing you can

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Speaker 2: do about it, and optimistic people, when they're hit with

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Speaker 2: bad events, believe temporary justice. One situation and I can

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Speaker 2: overcome it. Those are the people who never became helpless.

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Speaker 2: So that takes me thirty years into my career. And

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Speaker 2: then I began to realize that I wasn't working on pessimism.

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Speaker 2: I was working on the opposite optimism. And that coincided

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Speaker 2: with being elected president of the American Psychological Association in

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Speaker 2: nineteen ninety six. And presidents are supposed to have themes initiatives,

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Speaker 2: and I didn't know what mine was going to be.

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Speaker 2: And I had an epiphany which really led to positive psychology.

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Speaker 1: And so talk a little bit. If this is the

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Speaker 1: epiphany I'm thinking of that I've heard you talk about before.

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Speaker 1: I think it involves your daughter, the famous garden story,

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Speaker 1: And so walk me through what happened. You know what

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Speaker 1: she told you and where that epiphany came from.

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Speaker 2: Well, it's a beautiful day in the garden and NICKI,

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Speaker 2: who had just turned five years old, and I were weeding.

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Speaker 2: I was sweating away and weating and Nicki, damn it,

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Speaker 2: was having a great time. She was throwing weeds in

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Speaker 2: the air and dancing and singing, and I shouted at her.

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Speaker 2: I said, get to work, Nikki, and she walked away

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Speaker 2: and she came back and she said, this is literally

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Speaker 2: what happened. Daddy. Can I talk to you? I said, yeah,

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Speaker 2: what is it, Niki? And she said, well, Daddy, do

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Speaker 2: you remember before my fifth birthday that had occurred about

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Speaker 2: two weeks before that I was a whiner, that I

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Speaker 2: whined all the time. I said, yeah, Nikki, you are

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Speaker 2: a little horror And she said, well, Daddy, have you

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Speaker 2: noticed since my fifth birthday? I haven't whined once? Said

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Speaker 2: oh yeah, I said, well, Daddy, on my fifth birthday,

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Speaker 2: I decided I wasn't going to whine anymore. And that

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Speaker 2: was the hardest thing I've ever done. And if I

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Speaker 2: can stop whining, you can stop being such a grouch.

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Speaker 2: That hit me like a brick, and it caused me

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Speaker 2: to rethink in almost an instant three different things. The

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Speaker 2: first one was that she was absolutely right that I

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Speaker 2: was a grouch, and worse than that, I was proud

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Speaker 2: of being a grouch because I thought that anything that

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Speaker 2: produced success in my life because I could see what

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Speaker 2: was wrong with every effect And then occurred to me

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Speaker 2: for the very first time that maybe that got in

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Speaker 2: the way, and maybe any success I had in life

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Speaker 2: was because I could see what was right in things.

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Speaker 2: So I resolved to change. And indeed I'm no longer

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Speaker 2: a grouch. Nicky, by the way, is still a whining.

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Speaker 1: How old is she She's a clinical psychologist.

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Speaker 2: She's thirty years old and a very good therapist. But

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Speaker 2: at any rate, the first thing I realized that I

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Speaker 2: was a grouch, and I decided to change. The second

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Speaker 2: thing I realized is that my theory of teaching and

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Speaker 2: child development was all wrong. My theory was remedial. It

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Speaker 2: was somehow if you corrected all the errors that your

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Speaker 2: children made, you'd get an exemplary child. And I realized

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Speaker 2: how foolish that is, and that the job of a

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Speaker 2: teacher and a parent is not remedial. It's to find

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Speaker 2: out what the child is really good at and to

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Speaker 2: bring that out and to help her lead her life

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Speaker 2: around it. And Nikki was really good at talking to

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Speaker 2: adults and understanding what was going on in the world,

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Speaker 2: and indeed it's what makes her a good clinical psychologist.

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Speaker 2: Now she's run with that skill. But the third thing

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Speaker 2: was the reason you and I are talking, Laurie and

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Speaker 2: that was that psychology was half baked. It was all

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Speaker 2: baked about misery and suffering. And we've done okay with that,

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Speaker 2: far from perfectly. But our medications and our therapies were

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Speaker 2: all about the alleviation of suffering. But what we didn't

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Speaker 2: touch was a question of what's above zero? Could we

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Speaker 2: be happy? Could we have a good life. So my

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Speaker 2: theme became psychologists should be not only interested in what

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Speaker 2: cripple's life and how to get rid of it, but

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Speaker 2: rather what enhances life and to try to build more

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Speaker 2: of it. It really was a momentary epiphany changed my life,

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Speaker 2: both personally and professionally, and is the founding legend of

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Speaker 2: positive psychology.

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Speaker 1: And so when you introduced the idea at this American

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Speaker 1: Psychological Association meeting, you know, when you took on the presidency,

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Speaker 1: what was the reaction Because the field was pretty entrenched

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Speaker 1: in abnormal psychology and kind of the negative aspects of

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Speaker 1: human nature and fixing those. How did people react early on?

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Speaker 2: Well, it was pretty bimodals on the positive side. When

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Speaker 2: I started to speak about this, I noticed that people

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Speaker 2: in the audience were often weeping and would come up

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Speaker 2: to me afterwards and say, you know this is what

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Speaker 2: I always wanted to do to work on happiness, but

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Speaker 2: the only game in town was misery, so I became

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Speaker 2: a clinical psychologist. On the other hand, died in the world.

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Speaker 2: Clinical psychologists who saw the world through a pathology lens

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Speaker 2: were and are threatened by it.

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Speaker 1: But Marty wasn't deterred by all those naysayers. He used

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Speaker 1: his new role as president to embark on a new

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Speaker 1: and important phase of his career. He wanted to work

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Speaker 1: out exactly how we could all live better, more fulfilling,

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Speaker 1: happier lives. And we'll hear more from Marty about what

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Speaker 1: he learned when the Happiness Lab returns in a moment.

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Speaker 1: I'd probably need an entire season of shows to go

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Speaker 1: through all of legendary psychologist Marty Seligman's ideas and discoveries,

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Speaker 1: but one of his most influential notions is the importance

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Speaker 1: of what he calls flourishing. Marty has argued that this

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Speaker 1: is the key to leading a better life. In his view,

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Speaker 1: we need to do more than just seek out what

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Speaker 1: we usually think of as happiness.

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Speaker 2: For me, happiness is one fifth of positive psychology, so

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Speaker 2: irma perm P is positive emotion and by and large,

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Speaker 2: the notion of subjective well being happiness captures it. But

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Speaker 2: the smiley face and being merry is not even close

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Speaker 2: to what positive psychology is about. Positive psychology is about

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Speaker 2: what non suffering, free people choose. And indeed, one of

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Speaker 2: the things they choose is to feel good, but they

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Speaker 2: also choose to be engaged, they choose to have good relationships,

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Speaker 2: they choose to matter and mean in the world, and

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Speaker 2: very importantly, they choose to accomplish things. So positive psychology

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Speaker 2: is not just about subjective well being and happiness, but

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Speaker 2: very often about how you're doing in the world.

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Speaker 1: And it's also you've argued about the traits that get

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Speaker 1: you there, and this connects to a lot of your

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Speaker 1: work on character strengths. So I'm curious what got you

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Speaker 1: first interested in this idea of character and how we

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Speaker 1: could develop it more well.

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Speaker 2: When I was doing clinical psychology DSM, the diagnostic and

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Speaker 2: statistical manual was very important. These were all the traits

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Speaker 2: that were impeding life, and so when I started to

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Speaker 2: think about positive psychology, it seems to me we needed

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Speaker 2: a manual of the sanities, not just the insanities, the

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Speaker 2: sanities being the traits that built the good life that

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Speaker 2: led to a field. Chris Peterson was the central person

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Speaker 2: in that field. When we started to work on a

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Speaker 2: manual of the sanities, I called Chris. It happened to

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Speaker 2: be his fiftieth birthday. He is a head of the

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Speaker 2: clinical program at Michigan at the time, and I said,

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Speaker 2: what are you going to do for the rest of

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Speaker 2: your life, Chris? And he said, well, I don't know.

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Speaker 2: I said, well, what I'd like you to do is

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Speaker 2: take a three year sabbatical, come to pen and write

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Speaker 2: a manual of the sanities. And indeed he did because

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Speaker 2: I raised the money for it. He put my name

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Speaker 2: on it, and it began a field of positive character traits.

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Speaker 2: And so very important in positive psychology is measuring what

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Speaker 2: your highest strengths are and learning how to use those

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Speaker 2: positive traits more in life.

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Speaker 1: So give me a sense of what you mean by strength.

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Speaker 1: What are some of the common character strengths that people

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Speaker 1: could try to maximize.

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Speaker 2: Well, we settled on twenty four of them. They were

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Speaker 2: traits like social intelligence, spirituality, humor, bravery, temperance. And the

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Speaker 2: criteria for these strengths were something that all religions and

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Speaker 2: political philosophies that we could find across the globe agreed on.

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Speaker 1: And so what do you find people who use their

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Speaker 1: character strengths? What are some of the things that we

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Speaker 1: see them experiencing in their day to day life.

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Speaker 2: Well, in general, we find that when people use their

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Speaker 2: highest strengths, more life goes better. And so one of

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Speaker 2: the positive psychology exercises is to everyone listening right now,

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Speaker 2: I want to do this with you. Close your eyes, Laura,

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Speaker 2: your eyes are open.

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Speaker 1: I know I'm closing the right now.

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Speaker 2: Right, think of something that you have to do at

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Speaker 2: work that you don't like doing. Now, open your eyes.

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Speaker 2: Now almost everyone can think of things like that. And

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Speaker 2: now your task is to take the via the twenty

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Speaker 2: four Character Strengths test. It's free. About four million people

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Speaker 2: have taken it. It's at Authentic Happiness one word dot org.

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Speaker 2: And this tells you what your five highest strengths are.

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Speaker 2: So your exercise is now to take that thing you

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Speaker 2: don't like doing at work and do it with your

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Speaker 2: highest strength. For example, one of my students studied in

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Speaker 2: the library at Penn until midnight and then the worst

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Speaker 2: part of his day came about the thing he really

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Speaker 2: didn't like, and that is he had to take an

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Speaker 2: hour long walk through dangerous West Philadelphia at one in

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Speaker 2: the morning to get home. So he took the Signature

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Speaker 2: Strengths test and his highest strength was humor and playfulness.

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Speaker 2: So his assignment was to take that walk home using

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Speaker 2: humor and playfulness. Here's what he did. He bought a

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Speaker 2: pr roller blades and a stopwatch, and he declared it

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Speaker 2: an Olympic event and timed it every night until he

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Speaker 2: set the record, and then he would take longer routs

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Speaker 2: and this became the best part of his day. So

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Speaker 2: the importance of this is the stuff you're good at,

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Speaker 2: the stuff you like and be used to a company

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Speaker 2: and overcome the stuff you don't like, and when that happens,

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Speaker 2: happiness goes up and work gets better. We have a

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Speaker 2: culture in which we focus on traits that are wrong,

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Speaker 2: ways in which we screw up, and it's important to

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Speaker 2: correct your weaknesses, but even more important is to recognize

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Speaker 2: the strengths you do have and then to use them more.

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Speaker 1: What I love about the character strengths, especially when I've

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Speaker 1: used exercises like this with my students, is that you

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Speaker 1: also need to know what your strengths are. I think

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Speaker 1: we kind of implicitly know it, but when we start

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Speaker 1: to focus on it, like, you know, I really like

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Speaker 1: humor or I really love learning. You know, whenever I

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Speaker 1: take the VIA test, my top to our humor and

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Speaker 1: love of learning. And I feel like that's helped me

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Speaker 1: in shaping this podcast. You know, I got to do

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Speaker 1: goofy things for the podcast, or I got to take

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Speaker 1: on new topics where I get to learn something. And

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Speaker 1: so I'm curious, what are your signature strengths.

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Speaker 2: My own highest strengths are creativity, appreciation of beauty, and leadership.

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Speaker 2: And indeed, I take my own medicine and indeed I

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Speaker 2: try to lead my life around creativity, appreciation of beauty,

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Speaker 2: and leadership. It helped me to know what my strengths

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Speaker 2: were to actually say to myself, Hey, how can I

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Speaker 2: use creativity in the conversation that Laurie and I are

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Speaker 2: having now?

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Speaker 1: And I think this is the thing we forget is

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Speaker 1: that you know, we can use these in so many

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Speaker 1: different context right. We can use these at work. If

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Speaker 1: you're one of my college students, they can use these

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Speaker 1: when they're studying. Another domain in which I know you've

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Speaker 1: talked about using these is that we can use these

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Speaker 1: to build up relationships. One of the homework exercises I

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Speaker 1: use with students in my happiness class at Yale as

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Speaker 1: I make them go on a strengths date where they

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Speaker 1: have to figure out their strengths. You know, pick a

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Speaker 1: friend or a romantic partner, figure out that person's strengths,

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Speaker 1: and then find some activity that you can do together

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Speaker 1: that maximizes both. There's like creativity and love of learning.

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Speaker 1: You have to go to some new museum where you

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Speaker 1: do something creative together. Or one of the ones I

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Speaker 1: loved was a hair of my students came up with

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Speaker 1: bravery and they did one of these ropes courses together,

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Speaker 1: and they all say, like, that was so much more

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Speaker 1: fun than what we would normally do, which is probably

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Speaker 1: locked down and watch TV together and not do anything

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Speaker 1: that used your strengths.

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Speaker 2: In addition to using your strengths more what you've just

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Speaker 2: said about sharing them with someone else, Virtually everything that

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Speaker 2: we like doing goes better when we share with someone else.

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Speaker 2: And so I think that's a really basic principle of

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Speaker 2: well being.

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Speaker 1: Another thing that you've talked about a lot in your

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Speaker 1: work is this idea of resilience. So talk about what

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Speaker 1: resilience is and how you think of it from a

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Speaker 1: positive psychology lens.

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Speaker 2: I think resilience for me, different people define it differently

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Speaker 2: is coming back from defeat, coming back to normal functioning

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Speaker 2: from a bad event. So in many ways, resilience for

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Speaker 2: me is a word out of psychology as usual. It's

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Speaker 2: not about being super normal or better than you were.

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Speaker 2: And so for me, things like post traumatic growth are

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Speaker 2: more interesting than resilience. And indeed, if you look at

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Speaker 2: people like soldiers who experience bad events like combat, which

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Speaker 2: one of the worst things we can experience, the response

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Speaker 2: to very bad events is bell shaped, and on the

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Speaker 2: left hand side of the bell is post traumatic stress disorder,

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Speaker 2: people who collapse and become helpless, but in the middle

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Speaker 2: is resilience, and their resilience means you may have a

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Speaker 2: tough time in combat, but within three months your back

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Speaker 2: where you were. And then on the right hand side

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Speaker 2: of the bell is people who often go through post

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Speaker 2: traumatic stress disorder, but a year later are physically and

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Speaker 2: mentally stronger than they were to begin with. So I

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Speaker 2: guess I would want to contrast the notion of growth

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Speaker 2: to resilience. So these days I'm more interested in growth

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Speaker 2: than I am in resilience.

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Speaker 1: I'm curious how you got started on that in the

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Speaker 1: first place. How did that work begin?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it was in the middle of the Iraq War.

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Speaker 2: General George Casey, the Chief of Staff of the Army,

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Speaker 2: called me the Pentagon to a meeting of the General Staff.

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Speaker 2: And I looked around and sitting at the table were

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Speaker 2: all copies of my books and things like that. General

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Speaker 2: Casey said, well, Seligman, Professor Seligman, I called him sir.

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Speaker 2: I went to military school. I know about calling general sir.

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Speaker 2: He said, post traumatic stress disorder, suicide, drug abuse, panic, divorce.

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Speaker 2: What does positive psychology say about that? And I went

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Speaker 2: through the bell shape and I said, I think the

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Speaker 2: of what we can do in positive psychology is to

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Speaker 2: move the whole distribution toward post traumatic growth. Whereupon General

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Speaker 2: cases did two things. He said, First, he said, my

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Speaker 2: legacy to the United States Army is going to be

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Speaker 2: to create an army that is as mentally fit as

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Speaker 2: it is physically fit. And I'm going to allocate one

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Speaker 2: hundred and forty million dollars to doing that. And so

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Speaker 2: I said, well, how are you going to do it?

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Speaker 2: And he said, well, we've read your work in schools

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Speaker 2: and we see you teach teachers the skills of positive

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Speaker 2: psychology and resilience, and the teachers teach the students. Well,

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Speaker 2: we have forty thousand teachers in the army. I said, really,

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Speaker 2: he said, yeah, the drill sergeants. And so your job,

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Speaker 2: doctor Seligman, will be to train all forty thousand drill

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Speaker 2: sergeants in positive psychology and resilience, and they will train

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Speaker 2: the one point one million soldiers. And so that's how

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Speaker 2: our work with the military started. And I guess I

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Speaker 2: should tell you two outcomes of it that your audience

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Speaker 2: probably doesn't know about their new We created a psychometric

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Speaker 2: tests called the GAT the GAC that every soldier takes

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Speaker 2: the first day of joining the army, and these are

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Speaker 2: psychological tests with the good and bad stuff. Then we

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Speaker 2: follow people through the army and we've just completed two

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Speaker 2: major studies. I should say both of these studies are

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Speaker 2: not samples. This is everybody in the army. So the

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Speaker 2: first thing we asked was could you predict post traumatic

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Speaker 2: stress disorder? And so we took everyone who was deployed

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Speaker 2: to Iraq and Afghanistan, seventy seven thousand people, and we

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Speaker 2: asked who got post traumatic stress disorder. Three five hundred

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Speaker 2: of them are diagnosed with post romata stress disorder. And

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Speaker 2: it turns out you can predict from day one if

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Speaker 2: you both face serious combat and you're a catastrophizer, you're

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Speaker 2: three hundred and seventy percent more likely come down with

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Speaker 2: post traumatic stress disorder. The same exaggeration of post traumatic

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Speaker 2: stress disorder is true at every level of combat. So

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Speaker 2: one finding that came out of this we could predict

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Speaker 2: who is really vulnerable. The second finding is the reverse

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Speaker 2: and much closer to my interest. It's about success. It's

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Speaker 2: about who's going to do really well in the army.

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Speaker 2: This is now nine hundred and ninety thousand soldiers followed

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Speaker 2: for five years. Day one, they take the gap the

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Speaker 2: psychological test, and over the next five years, twelve percent

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Speaker 2: of them win a Heroism of medal or an Exemplary

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Speaker 2: Work medal. And the question is could we predict who's

433
00:26:05,516 --> 00:26:08,876
Speaker 2: going to really succeed in the army by heroism and

434
00:26:09,276 --> 00:26:12,636
Speaker 2: untry work? And again the answer was we could robustly

435
00:26:12,716 --> 00:26:18,236
Speaker 2: predict it. There were three psychological factors. First, optimistic people,

436
00:26:18,636 --> 00:26:22,876
Speaker 2: second people with more positive emotion, and third people with

437
00:26:23,036 --> 00:26:27,156
Speaker 2: low negative emotion. Are more likely, we've been able to

438
00:26:27,156 --> 00:26:31,756
Speaker 2: predict post traumatic stress disorder by being a catastrophizer, and

439
00:26:32,436 --> 00:26:35,436
Speaker 2: who's going to do really well in the army by

440
00:26:35,636 --> 00:26:39,636
Speaker 2: high positive emotion, high optimism, and low negative emotion.

441
00:26:40,596 --> 00:26:43,956
Speaker 1: Even the most rigorous researchers struggle to amass data sets

442
00:26:43,996 --> 00:26:47,076
Speaker 1: like this. I mean, lots of psychology experiments are run

443
00:26:47,236 --> 00:26:50,956
Speaker 1: using dozens or maybe a few hundred test subjects. Marty's

444
00:26:50,956 --> 00:26:53,756
Speaker 1: work looked at the lives of tens of thousands of people,

445
00:26:54,356 --> 00:26:57,516
Speaker 1: literally a whole army, and his findings speak to the

446
00:26:57,556 --> 00:27:00,756
Speaker 1: power of optimism to improve our lives, which is something

447
00:27:00,796 --> 00:27:03,196
Speaker 1: we'll explore in a whole lot more detail when the

448
00:27:03,236 --> 00:27:17,476
Speaker 1: Happiness Lab returns after the shortbreak. Research shows that being

449
00:27:17,476 --> 00:27:20,596
Speaker 1: a hopeful, optimistic person is a great indicator that you'll

450
00:27:20,596 --> 00:27:23,596
Speaker 1: flourish in life, even when things go wrong or you

451
00:27:23,716 --> 00:27:28,356
Speaker 1: find yourself in awful situations like, for example, military combat.

452
00:27:29,636 --> 00:27:33,116
Speaker 1: Marty Seligman's massive research project with the US Army made

453
00:27:33,156 --> 00:27:36,876
Speaker 1: this clear. But what exactly is the power of optimism,

454
00:27:37,436 --> 00:27:39,796
Speaker 1: how does it work? And is it something that all

455
00:27:39,836 --> 00:27:40,596
Speaker 1: of us can learn?

456
00:27:41,436 --> 00:27:46,516
Speaker 2: First and most importantly, optimists try harder, they don't give up,

457
00:27:46,876 --> 00:27:52,116
Speaker 2: they're more persistent. Secondly, when bad events hit them, they're

458
00:27:52,556 --> 00:27:56,996
Speaker 2: half as likely to get depressed. They're more likely to

459
00:27:57,116 --> 00:28:01,316
Speaker 2: come back and be resilient. Third people like them better.

460
00:28:01,636 --> 00:28:05,996
Speaker 2: So while misery loves company, company does not like misery

461
00:28:06,476 --> 00:28:11,956
Speaker 2: in the workplace. In sports, they come back from defeat better.

462
00:28:12,436 --> 00:28:17,916
Speaker 2: So Optimistic pitchers in close games in the major leagues

463
00:28:18,276 --> 00:28:21,916
Speaker 2: in the last three innings, their earn run average gets better.

464
00:28:22,236 --> 00:28:26,116
Speaker 2: Optimistic hitters in the last three innings in close games,

465
00:28:26,396 --> 00:28:31,276
Speaker 2: their betting average goes up. The pessimists go down in

466
00:28:31,436 --> 00:28:35,676
Speaker 2: close games and do worse. But at any rate, optimism,

467
00:28:35,996 --> 00:28:40,316
Speaker 2: because it produces more trying, by and large, seems to

468
00:28:40,356 --> 00:28:43,716
Speaker 2: be a very big advantage in life, and in some

469
00:28:43,756 --> 00:28:47,396
Speaker 2: ways the most surprising thing of all is that optimists

470
00:28:47,396 --> 00:28:51,916
Speaker 2: live on average between six and eight years longer than pessimists,

471
00:28:52,196 --> 00:28:54,236
Speaker 2: and there are now about twenty good studies of this.

472
00:28:54,436 --> 00:29:00,276
Speaker 2: Controlling for all the major risk factors, particularly for cardiovascular disease,

473
00:29:00,916 --> 00:29:04,756
Speaker 2: Pessimism is probably between smoking two and three packs of

474
00:29:04,756 --> 00:29:09,436
Speaker 2: cigarettes a day as a risk factor, and optimism seems

475
00:29:09,516 --> 00:29:12,956
Speaker 2: to give between six and eight years of extra life,

476
00:29:13,156 --> 00:29:16,556
Speaker 2: probably about twice as important as exercise.

477
00:29:16,876 --> 00:29:19,556
Speaker 1: I mean, all of those are amazing findings, but if

478
00:29:19,596 --> 00:29:22,116
Speaker 1: you don't know the literature on optimism and hope, you

479
00:29:22,196 --> 00:29:24,876
Speaker 1: might find them kind of depressing because I think many

480
00:29:24,996 --> 00:29:28,196
Speaker 1: lay people have this notion that you're either born an

481
00:29:28,236 --> 00:29:29,676
Speaker 1: optimist or born a pessimist.

482
00:29:29,756 --> 00:29:29,876
Speaker 2: You know.

483
00:29:29,876 --> 00:29:31,876
Speaker 1: So it's all well and good. If you're born an optimist,

484
00:29:31,996 --> 00:29:33,756
Speaker 1: then you're going to live longer and you know, get

485
00:29:33,796 --> 00:29:36,636
Speaker 1: through these tough games faster. But if you're not tough

486
00:29:36,676 --> 00:29:38,796
Speaker 1: for you. But this seems to be something that your

487
00:29:38,836 --> 00:29:40,836
Speaker 1: work has shown too, which is that it's not just

488
00:29:40,876 --> 00:29:44,476
Speaker 1: that there's optimism and pessimism, but that there's learned optimism.

489
00:29:44,676 --> 00:29:47,236
Speaker 1: It's almost kind of coming full circle from your original

490
00:29:47,276 --> 00:29:50,796
Speaker 1: work on learned helplessness. So talk about how optimism can

491
00:29:50,836 --> 00:29:53,116
Speaker 1: be learned and what we figured out about how we

492
00:29:53,156 --> 00:29:54,916
Speaker 1: can kind of bring it into our lives. If that's

493
00:29:54,956 --> 00:29:56,716
Speaker 1: not our natural tendency.

494
00:29:56,876 --> 00:30:02,356
Speaker 2: Well, first we should confirm the unlearned part. So in Twinsburg, Ohio,

495
00:30:02,636 --> 00:30:06,356
Speaker 2: every year there's a Twins convention. Ten thy twins show up.

496
00:30:06,556 --> 00:30:08,956
Speaker 2: One year, we went to Twinsburg and we gave them

497
00:30:09,196 --> 00:30:13,636
Speaker 2: optimism Pessimism questionnaire. Half of them are fraternal twins and

498
00:30:13,676 --> 00:30:17,956
Speaker 2: half are identical twins. And we measured concordance, and it

499
00:30:18,036 --> 00:30:23,316
Speaker 2: turns out identical twins are much more concordant than fraternal twins.

500
00:30:23,316 --> 00:30:28,036
Speaker 2: For optimism or pessimism, it's about fifty percent heritable. Okay,

501
00:30:28,276 --> 00:30:32,156
Speaker 2: so people are partly right. Optimism is partly inherited. But

502
00:30:32,636 --> 00:30:34,956
Speaker 2: it turns out if you're a pessimist like I am,

503
00:30:35,556 --> 00:30:40,236
Speaker 2: you can learn optimism. And the basic skill comes straight

504
00:30:40,276 --> 00:30:43,876
Speaker 2: out of cognitive therapy. First, you want to be able

505
00:30:43,916 --> 00:30:48,076
Speaker 2: to recognize the most catastrophic thoughts you say to yourself,

506
00:30:48,316 --> 00:30:53,396
Speaker 2: and then you want to realistically dispute them. I'm eighty

507
00:30:53,476 --> 00:30:56,516
Speaker 2: years old now, and before I got on this call

508
00:30:56,556 --> 00:30:58,516
Speaker 2: with you, I said, oh my god, can I really

509
00:30:58,556 --> 00:31:02,876
Speaker 2: survive an hour of a I'm really too old to

510
00:31:02,916 --> 00:31:06,836
Speaker 2: be doing this kind of thing. And I recognize that thought.

511
00:31:06,996 --> 00:31:09,396
Speaker 2: Maybe I should just give up and turn it over

512
00:31:09,436 --> 00:31:12,916
Speaker 2: to the young people. Then when we started, I could

513
00:31:13,316 --> 00:31:17,276
Speaker 2: recognize the thought and I treated it as if it

514
00:31:17,396 --> 00:31:20,876
Speaker 2: was said by someone who a third person whose mission

515
00:31:20,916 --> 00:31:25,036
Speaker 2: in life was to make me miserable, and I disputed

516
00:31:25,116 --> 00:31:29,316
Speaker 2: it with realistic evidence. So you're not only a good interviewer,

517
00:31:29,356 --> 00:31:33,036
Speaker 2: but you smile and laugh and you show real responses

518
00:31:33,436 --> 00:31:37,116
Speaker 2: when I'm doing something that really makes sense. So I said, well, look,

519
00:31:37,236 --> 00:31:40,276
Speaker 2: Laurie really gets if this is going really well. So

520
00:31:40,676 --> 00:31:46,716
Speaker 2: what you do is you realistically dispute your most catastrophic thoughts.

521
00:31:47,036 --> 00:31:49,556
Speaker 2: And I become quite skilled of that. I'm a born

522
00:31:50,076 --> 00:31:53,476
Speaker 2: pessimist and a born depressive, and I still hear the

523
00:31:53,556 --> 00:31:57,076
Speaker 2: voices all the time that tell me I'm a reject,

524
00:31:57,156 --> 00:32:00,996
Speaker 2: I'm a loser, but I know how to dispute them now.

525
00:32:01,116 --> 00:32:03,596
Speaker 2: And that's the basic skill of learned optimism.

526
00:32:03,916 --> 00:32:06,036
Speaker 1: And if you learn optimism in that way, do you

527
00:32:06,076 --> 00:32:08,316
Speaker 1: get Is there evidence that you get as many benefits

528
00:32:08,356 --> 00:32:10,476
Speaker 1: as somebody who might come about it naturally.

529
00:32:10,836 --> 00:32:14,156
Speaker 2: I don't think anyone has ever tested that. That's a

530
00:32:14,436 --> 00:32:18,316
Speaker 2: really interesting thing. And the difference in many ways is

531
00:32:18,356 --> 00:32:21,476
Speaker 2: I think the people who get it heritably don't hear

532
00:32:21,556 --> 00:32:24,916
Speaker 2: the voices all the time telling them what a failure

533
00:32:24,996 --> 00:32:27,716
Speaker 2: they are, and the people who learn it really have

534
00:32:27,836 --> 00:32:32,596
Speaker 2: to work. So learned optimism is work, doesn't become naturally.

535
00:32:32,916 --> 00:32:35,036
Speaker 1: And I think this is in some ways a message

536
00:32:35,116 --> 00:32:37,436
Speaker 1: in a lot of positive psychology, right, which is that

537
00:32:37,836 --> 00:32:41,036
Speaker 1: we can go above baseline, we can flourish more, but

538
00:32:41,276 --> 00:32:43,396
Speaker 1: sometimes it actually does take some work. You need to

539
00:32:43,396 --> 00:32:45,796
Speaker 1: put work in. You need to be following your strength

540
00:32:45,876 --> 00:32:48,356
Speaker 1: and paying attention to them. You need to fight those

541
00:32:48,556 --> 00:32:51,916
Speaker 1: tendencies to talk badly to yourself. If you're a natural pessimist,

542
00:32:52,156 --> 00:32:55,116
Speaker 1: you know you can experience hope and optimism in all

543
00:32:55,116 --> 00:32:57,236
Speaker 1: these positive rewards, but sometimes you get to put a

544
00:32:57,236 --> 00:32:59,396
Speaker 1: little bit of work into. Even if you are the

545
00:32:59,396 --> 00:33:02,196
Speaker 1: father of positive psychology himself, Marty Seligman, you have to

546
00:33:02,196 --> 00:33:02,996
Speaker 1: put this work in.

547
00:33:03,196 --> 00:33:06,996
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think at the heart of why the positive

548
00:33:07,036 --> 00:33:10,716
Speaker 2: stuff has to be learned is that we inherited from

549
00:33:10,756 --> 00:33:15,356
Speaker 2: our ancestors a bad weather brain. The most recent geological

550
00:33:15,396 --> 00:33:19,116
Speaker 2: epoch was the ice ages, and those of your ancestors

551
00:33:19,356 --> 00:33:23,036
Speaker 2: who thought, oh, it's a beautiful day in new Haven today,

552
00:33:23,236 --> 00:33:26,596
Speaker 2: A bet it'll be beautiful tomorrow got crushed by the ice.

553
00:33:27,356 --> 00:33:30,756
Speaker 2: And it was your ancestors who said, things look okay,

554
00:33:30,996 --> 00:33:34,716
Speaker 2: but famine is coming, and ice is coming, and one

555
00:33:34,796 --> 00:33:38,436
Speaker 2: tragedy or another is coming. They survive because they were right,

556
00:33:38,916 --> 00:33:44,316
Speaker 2: and we got their brain. Unfortunately, if prosperity continues and

557
00:33:44,356 --> 00:33:47,436
Speaker 2: it is a nice day in new Haven tomorrow, it'll

558
00:33:47,436 --> 00:33:50,396
Speaker 2: be ruined. If all you can think of is how

559
00:33:50,436 --> 00:33:53,756
Speaker 2: miserable everything's going to be so now in a world

560
00:33:54,196 --> 00:33:57,876
Speaker 2: which is much more prosperous by almost every measure we

561
00:33:58,036 --> 00:34:02,036
Speaker 2: have than the world used to be. The pessimistic brain

562
00:34:02,316 --> 00:34:05,796
Speaker 2: does not serve you very well, and an optimistic brain

563
00:34:06,236 --> 00:34:08,676
Speaker 2: allows you to take advantage of prosperity.

564
00:34:09,116 --> 00:34:11,436
Speaker 1: And so, as you think about prosperity in this field,

565
00:34:11,556 --> 00:34:13,916
Speaker 1: what are the things that make you optimistic about where

566
00:34:13,956 --> 00:34:16,836
Speaker 1: positive psychology is going to be in the next fifty years.

567
00:34:16,956 --> 00:34:19,876
Speaker 1: What are your predictions about how positive psychology will flourish

568
00:34:19,876 --> 00:34:20,396
Speaker 1: in the future.

569
00:34:20,756 --> 00:34:25,036
Speaker 2: Well, I've been mapping as people like Steve Pinker have

570
00:34:25,516 --> 00:34:29,956
Speaker 2: progress over the last two hundred years, and essentially you

571
00:34:29,996 --> 00:34:33,116
Speaker 2: have to be blinded by ideology not to see how

572
00:34:33,156 --> 00:34:36,036
Speaker 2: much better the world is now than it was two

573
00:34:36,156 --> 00:34:39,756
Speaker 2: hundred years ago. Two hundred years ago, forty four percent

574
00:34:39,756 --> 00:34:43,076
Speaker 2: of your children died before the age of five. Now

575
00:34:43,156 --> 00:34:46,636
Speaker 2: one percent of children die before the age of five.

576
00:34:46,996 --> 00:34:49,916
Speaker 2: Two hundred years ago, the mean human life expectancy was

577
00:34:49,956 --> 00:34:54,996
Speaker 2: about thirty five years. Life expectancy across the entire world

578
00:34:55,596 --> 00:34:59,116
Speaker 2: has doubled in the last two hundred years. It's not

579
00:34:59,276 --> 00:35:04,076
Speaker 2: just these material things that have changed to measure, Women's

580
00:35:04,156 --> 00:35:08,916
Speaker 2: rights and racism not perfect, but it's a lot better

581
00:35:08,916 --> 00:35:11,876
Speaker 2: than it was two hundred years ago when we had

582
00:35:11,916 --> 00:35:16,876
Speaker 2: slavery and women couldn't vote. So by almost every material

583
00:35:17,196 --> 00:35:22,236
Speaker 2: and spiritual dimension, life has gotten better over the last

584
00:35:22,236 --> 00:35:26,196
Speaker 2: two hundred years. And now the question is will it continue?

585
00:35:26,596 --> 00:35:29,436
Speaker 2: And this is a very important question. I mean, we

586
00:35:29,476 --> 00:35:34,036
Speaker 2: need to overcome all sorts of stuff, avoid economic collapse,

587
00:35:34,116 --> 00:35:37,516
Speaker 2: we need to avoid nuclear war, we need to avoid

588
00:35:37,636 --> 00:35:41,276
Speaker 2: climate collapse. But if we do all of those things,

589
00:35:41,436 --> 00:35:44,836
Speaker 2: then there's good reason to believe that human innovation and

590
00:35:44,956 --> 00:35:49,316
Speaker 2: prosperity will continue. If that is so, we need a

591
00:35:49,356 --> 00:35:53,276
Speaker 2: psychology that goes along with it, a psychology that tells

592
00:35:53,356 --> 00:35:56,156
Speaker 2: us that everything is wrong and all we can talk

593
00:35:56,156 --> 00:36:00,196
Speaker 2: about is reducing misery is not really conducive to producing

594
00:36:00,596 --> 00:36:03,916
Speaker 2: more and more prosperity and more and more innovation. So

595
00:36:04,076 --> 00:36:07,916
Speaker 2: I think it is vouchsafe to positive psychologists not just

596
00:36:08,076 --> 00:36:12,796
Speaker 2: to witness increase prosperity over the next fifty years, but

597
00:36:12,916 --> 00:36:18,316
Speaker 2: to actually help more and more prosperity to occur.

598
00:36:19,036 --> 00:36:21,196
Speaker 1: When we look at the work in positive psychology, there's

599
00:36:21,236 --> 00:36:23,836
Speaker 1: so many tips and so many changes that people can

600
00:36:23,876 --> 00:36:26,396
Speaker 1: make to kind of improve their sense of flourishing. If

601
00:36:26,436 --> 00:36:28,436
Speaker 1: you had to boil it down to your three favorite

602
00:36:28,436 --> 00:36:30,716
Speaker 1: tips or the three ones that have worked best for you.

603
00:36:31,116 --> 00:36:32,316
Speaker 1: What would some of those tips be.

604
00:36:32,916 --> 00:36:37,116
Speaker 2: Well, my very favorite, which I'm often asked by depress people,

605
00:36:37,356 --> 00:36:40,316
Speaker 2: is what's the number one thing I can do if

606
00:36:40,316 --> 00:36:44,556
Speaker 2: I'm depressed right now? And the answer is to turn

607
00:36:44,636 --> 00:36:49,676
Speaker 2: off this seminar, go out and find someone who needs

608
00:36:50,036 --> 00:36:54,956
Speaker 2: help and help them. Turns out, our heedonic system is

609
00:36:55,156 --> 00:36:59,596
Speaker 2: built to turn on when we help others, So that's

610
00:36:59,636 --> 00:37:03,156
Speaker 2: my number one. My number two, I think is that

611
00:37:03,436 --> 00:37:09,276
Speaker 2: learning optimism and cultivating optimism will produce more success in

612
00:37:09,316 --> 00:37:15,036
Speaker 2: the workplace, less depression, and longer life. And my third

613
00:37:15,636 --> 00:37:19,756
Speaker 2: is anything you like doing, do it with someone else,

614
00:37:20,236 --> 00:37:21,116
Speaker 2: it'll enhance it.

615
00:37:21,436 --> 00:37:24,156
Speaker 1: Those are some fantastic go tos, easy things that people

616
00:37:24,236 --> 00:37:26,436
Speaker 1: can latch onto to go from there. And in addition

617
00:37:26,476 --> 00:37:28,476
Speaker 1: to all this fantastic work, you also have a new

618
00:37:28,516 --> 00:37:30,636
Speaker 1: book out right now, Tomorrow Mind. So talk to me

619
00:37:30,676 --> 00:37:33,436
Speaker 1: about Tomorrow Mind and tell me what it teaches well.

620
00:37:33,436 --> 00:37:38,036
Speaker 2: With Gabriella Kellerman, we've asked the question what skills the

621
00:37:38,196 --> 00:37:41,916
Speaker 2: workers today need in a whitewater world in which their

622
00:37:41,956 --> 00:37:46,356
Speaker 2: skills get outmoded every six months? And Tomorrow Mind talks

623
00:37:46,396 --> 00:37:52,916
Speaker 2: about five skills. The acronym is prism pri FM, where

624
00:37:53,236 --> 00:37:59,396
Speaker 2: P is prospection, future mindedness, making people better perspectors of

625
00:37:59,436 --> 00:38:05,196
Speaker 2: the future. R is resilience and optimism. I is innovation

626
00:38:05,916 --> 00:38:11,836
Speaker 2: and creativity. S is social skills, particularly rapid rap or

627
00:38:12,476 --> 00:38:16,116
Speaker 2: and M is mattering and meaning at work.

628
00:38:16,396 --> 00:38:18,436
Speaker 1: And so these are all skills that I think matter

629
00:38:18,476 --> 00:38:21,116
Speaker 1: at work, but they're kind of building on the models

630
00:38:21,116 --> 00:38:23,236
Speaker 1: of flourishing that you've talked about. Generally, they're the kinds

631
00:38:23,276 --> 00:38:25,116
Speaker 1: of things that can help us succeed at work. But

632
00:38:25,156 --> 00:38:28,196
Speaker 1: if we master all the things in this prison acronym,

633
00:38:28,316 --> 00:38:30,476
Speaker 1: it's also kind of the techniques that will make us

634
00:38:30,516 --> 00:38:31,436
Speaker 1: happier generally.

635
00:38:31,796 --> 00:38:36,756
Speaker 2: Indeed, and Gabriella Kellerman is both a psychiatrist and comes

636
00:38:36,796 --> 00:38:39,156
Speaker 2: from the world of work and trying to make work

637
00:38:39,276 --> 00:38:43,116
Speaker 2: a happier place. So it's been a particular privilege for

638
00:38:43,196 --> 00:38:47,556
Speaker 2: me to be second author with Gabriella on how work

639
00:38:47,596 --> 00:38:50,036
Speaker 2: can be happier than it is today.

640
00:38:50,556 --> 00:38:53,396
Speaker 1: Well, all my gratitude for starting this field off that

641
00:38:53,476 --> 00:38:56,676
Speaker 1: can help all of the slightly younger guns to make

642
00:38:56,756 --> 00:38:59,156
Speaker 1: that happen, and to share all this great science with

643
00:38:59,316 --> 00:39:02,476
Speaker 1: everybody out there. We've already kept you over time, which

644
00:39:02,516 --> 00:39:05,196
Speaker 1: is exactly what I expected what happened, so we should

645
00:39:05,236 --> 00:39:07,396
Speaker 1: let you go. But this is really awesome. It's meant

646
00:39:07,436 --> 00:39:09,716
Speaker 1: a lot to be able to share this work, and

647
00:39:09,756 --> 00:39:12,036
Speaker 1: I feel like telling your story been something I've wanted

648
00:39:12,036 --> 00:39:13,636
Speaker 1: to do for a long time, so I'm so happy

649
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Speaker 1: we could make it happen.

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Speaker 2: Good. Well, thank you, it's wonderful to see you.

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00:39:17,716 --> 00:39:22,716
Speaker 1: Ditto, Dittoh, thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed

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00:39:22,756 --> 00:39:24,956
Speaker 1: this chat with Marty Seligman as much as I did.

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00:39:25,476 --> 00:39:28,076
Speaker 1: Hearing Marty's story reminds me that it's an honor to

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Speaker 1: live in the time we do right now, when we've

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Speaker 1: learned so much about the kinds of things we can

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Speaker 1: do to live a more flourishing life. So why not

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00:39:35,716 --> 00:39:38,036
Speaker 1: commit to the practices you just heard that you know

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00:39:38,116 --> 00:39:40,956
Speaker 1: will make you feel better. You could start discovering your

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00:39:41,036 --> 00:39:44,356
Speaker 1: character strengths. As Marty mentioned, you can head to his

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00:39:44,436 --> 00:39:48,436
Speaker 1: free website, authentic happiness dot org and take the via

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00:39:48,716 --> 00:39:52,156
Speaker 1: Character Strengths Survey. Once you learn what your strengths are,

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00:39:52,396 --> 00:39:54,876
Speaker 1: you can find ways to put them into practice this week.

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00:39:55,716 --> 00:39:58,516
Speaker 1: Or you could commit to changing your mindset and experiencing

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Speaker 1: a bit more learned optimism. If you want more tips

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00:40:01,556 --> 00:40:03,796
Speaker 1: on how to do that, you should check out Marty's

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00:40:03,836 --> 00:40:08,196
Speaker 1: new book Tomorrow Mind Thriving at Work with resilience, creativity

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00:40:08,236 --> 00:40:12,796
Speaker 1: and connection now and in an uncertain future. The Happiness

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00:40:12,836 --> 00:40:15,196
Speaker 1: Lab will be back soon with an extra special tree,

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Speaker 1: not just the usual shows recorded inside my beloved podcast closet,

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00:40:20,036 --> 00:40:22,636
Speaker 1: but two new episodes that we recorded live in front

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Speaker 1: of a real studio audience of fans just like you.

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Speaker 1: So I hope you'll join me back again soon for

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Speaker 1: the next episode of the Happiness Lab with me Doctor

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Speaker 1: Laurie Santos. The Happiness Lab is co written by Ryan

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00:40:42,356 --> 00:40:45,516
Speaker 1: Dilly and is produced by Ryan Dilly, Jess Shane and

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00:40:45,556 --> 00:40:48,756
Speaker 1: Britney Brown. The show was mastered by Evan Viola and

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00:40:48,836 --> 00:40:52,876
Speaker 1: our original music was composed by Zachary Silver. Special thanks

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00:40:52,956 --> 00:40:57,996
Speaker 1: to Greta Cohne, Eric Sandler, Carl Migliori, Morgan Rattner, Jacob Weisberg,

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Speaker 1: my agent, Ben Davis, and the rest of the Pushkin team.

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Speaker 1: The Happiness Lab is brought to you by Pushkin Industries

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Speaker 1: and by me, Doctor Lariy Santos,