2022年哈佛幸福课英文笔记.doc

/8/3 lesson 1

Positive psychology
Teacher:Tal

Intro
Pos psy is popular and it really works
(Self help movement lacks substence, over-promising and low-delivering)
My aim is to create a bridge between the ivory tower and mainstreet(to bridge the gap)
----science that works,theories that can be applied
Requirements:1.Anonymous emails
2.Raise your hand if you had any problem
3.Active note-taking(write down what you think is significant)
We need “time-in”, that means to stop for a moment and look inward(quiet times), to embrace stillness
It’s unecessary to fill in all the gaps(Indian appreciate absence of words)
PP Background---from humanistic psychology (the third force)
Three forces:
1. behaviorism(Skinner)regard huaman as a box(H: we have soul and spirits)
2. Psychoanalysis(Freud,Jung)(H:ask for more dignity and morality)
3. humanistic psychology(a reaction to behaviorism,lacks specific theories)
Abraham Maslow:the first one claim that we should research on kindness and goodness and optimism
Karen Horney:look at the fine qualities and cultivate them
Aeron Antonovsky: “Salutogenesis”(the origin of health)
Next stage:
Martin Seligman:the father of PP(2 aims),Ellen Langer,Philip Stone
The story of a form(it’s the shape of the container, or you interpretation of life that counts,it’s all about “transformation”)
The story of Michelangelo:to chip away the excess stone, to get rid of barriers and limitations
To make common sense more common, nothing new but “reminding”
Self-actualization, fulfiling our potential, chip away the limitations
We’ll bring up more question marks
At the end of this course just tell me the changes on you, what you are doing differently
Q1:Am I happy?
Happiness resides in a continuum(no definite definition of happiness or unhappiness), the question, however, is “How can I be happier?”

/8/4 lesson 2

Words before the class:
The class is for everyone, not just for people who are unhappy
Not everything works for you,make a choice
You’ll have to hand in the response paper
Let’s welcome Deb Levy from extension school
Why do we focus on pos psy?
People have been spending too much time on negative studies(21:1), these are things what doesn’t work.
At the same time, more and more depression, neurosis and suicide happens. For example, 47% Havard students have experienced depression of not functioning during last year.
3 reasons
1.What works or what we focus on rather creates reality
2.Being happy is not just the negation of unhappiness
3.The most effective way of prevention is to focus on the positive
Now next one, how do we focus on what works?
A research in 1980s:
Why do some people succeed despite the unfavorable circumstances?
Pos psy begin to study on these people.(resilience, an ability to adapt to the environment, was found in this way. And it works for everyone.)
From the pathogenenic model to the salutogenenic model
A person constantly think about his weaknesses can’t succeed. We have to ask ourselves: what am I good at? To draw attention to the positive things, we had to raise up such questions from time to time.
In a word: questions create reality.
My role model:Marva Collins
How can we keep students in school?(in Chicago)
Call up self-confidence and self-esteem by repeating reminding
See the seed greatness in children

/8/5 lesson 3

Review the 3 reasons(supplement):
2.If we take away all the negative factors, will we be happy?It’s like the relationship between food and your tase sense.
People nowadays are in “comfortably numb”or “quiet desperation”.
4. Our aim is to cultivate the capacity to resist the nagative effects or to strengthen our immune system.

Premises(5)
1.Bridge building Vs. Division and separation
Let’s begin with bridge building
How is academia related to us?
The story of young students: idealism is not enough(many people have no access to psychological theories, let alone apply them)
Identical twins, even brought up in different circumstances, have the same character and same degree of happiness. Genes do matter a lot, but in this case we also see that internal factors(psychological, or character) play an extremely important role in wellbeing. Charaters are basically determined by genes, but can be changed.
We can not exclude the average or why most people fail, but let’s also focus on those “best examples”.Human nature will be sold short when we only study the average(Abraham Maslow).

The Cambridge-Somerville Youth Study Psychology”,started in 1930s
Chose 250 kids from an at-risk population, 5-year- intervention, got academic help from the best doctors and professors(best treatment,psychological)
The control group, also 250 kids
40 years follow-up
The results were shocking:
Juvenile offenses—no difference
Adult offences—no difference
Physical health and mental health—no difference
Alcoholism---significant
Job status---significant(the white collar jobs)
But things in control group were much better, that means intervention did more harm than good(wasn’t practical).

/8/6 lesson 4

Last time we’ve talked about a famous research, and through this I want to tell you is that only passion is not enough, we need to be the realistic idealist, to research on what works.

2.Change is possible Vs. Change is illusive
Can I make a difference?
---Most people underestimate their ability to bring about change.
“All history is a record of the power of minorties, and of minorities of one.”(by Emerson)
All change begins in the mind of single person or a small group.And then it expand.
How does it expand?How change happens?
---change happens exponentially(connections create a “butterfly effect”, just like smiles are contagious)

3.Internal factors primarily determine happiness Vs. Happiness is primarily a function of external circumstances
Many scientists use “objective measures”, for example,scan our brain.
Extreme circumstances make very little difference to our wellbeing(and can’t last long, soon it will return to the base level).
Once our basic needs are met, too much wealth can’t make a difference.
If we lower our expectations, we’ll probably be happier. But it’s whether we had right or wrong expectations that determines our wellbeing.
We need to change our perception, our mental state, and our interpretation about the world.
Internal factors do matter, and we need transformations.

4.Human nature must be obeyed Vs. Human nature must be perfected
So,can human nature(instinct, desire,ect) be changed?
2 opposite visions
Actually our nature cannot be changed but rather be guided(in other words, it’s managable).
The difference between the saddest and the happiest is their ability to recover.
And our psychological immune system strengthens when we give ourselves the permission to be human.
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;the courage to the things I can change;and the wisdom to know the dfference.”
This wisdom can be learned throughout the semester.

Then,what it really means to give ourselves the permission to be a human?
Now I want to do a group meditation.Try to understand it, not only in cognitive level of the research but also to experience on the visceral emotional level.

Try to remind yourself of it once or twice a day and allow others to do so---you deserve it.

/8/7 lesson5and6

an organization----Teach For America
Just apply, give yourself an opportunity, our school needs you.

I’ll introduce two friends, supporters of pos psy.
And they will give a brief presentation about the Masters of Applied Positive Psychology at University of Pennsylvania(the only and the first).

5. Happiness is and ought to be our ultimate endVS.Happiness should be a secondary pursuit
Why should we have happiness as our hightest end, as our chief concern?
Positive emotions have an evolutionary reason,beyond just making us feeling good, it’s about building capacities(immune systems, ect).---by Barbara Fredrickson
When you are under negative influences, your consciousness narrows and constricts, entering a downward spiral, a vicious cycle.
Postive emotions can bring us from the downward spiral to the upward spiral.

Pursuing my happiness, isn’t that selfish? But selfishness is not identical to immorality.
1. happiness is a positive sum game(not zero or negative), for happiness is contagious, it’s like passing on light.
2. people who experience a lot,all the ups and downs, but overall work on happiness and become happier and happier,have better relationships. More generous, more tolerant.(not people who are “always happy” )
3. helping others is also helping ourselves(both happy)
selfishness is part of our nature

a story of Gandi
--- “Be the change you want to see in the world.”
Most people do as what you do rather than what you say(also apply to leadership).
The best way of spreading happiness is to work on your own happiness, then you’re leading by example.

Belief
A story of Roger Bannister,a runner
No runner can run 1 mile for under 4 minutes before.
He used to be a doctor, but eventually succeed.It became known as the “dream mile”.
In following years, this result has always been improving.
---Beliefs do matter a lot.

Pygmalion
This theory is commonly used in the field of education.
It works---beliefs as self-fufiling prophecies.

(lesson6)
The situation is powerful,but can we also create a powerful, positive sitatution to bring out the best in people?
The answer is yes.
Priming can be done in the conscious or subconscious level, it means planting a belief or a word.
People who were primed with “old words”behave exactly like an old person, that’s subconscious.
The priming study is also related to iceberg principle, that when you’re measuring a phenomenon, you’re changing the phenomenon as well as changing yourself.
So by researching the positive we’re also priming ourselves.

Most of these theories come from the self help movement, our mind creates the world
“Whatever your mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.”.(the law of attraction)
Such powering words appeal to many people.
But is the meassge right?
--- It draws on a truth and blows it out of proportion(not create, but”co-create”)

Albert Bandura, reading task for this week.
He thinks that people with strong beliefs produce their future rather than simply foretell it.
And this ability can be learned, we can transform our “form”.
In other words,“self concept is destiny”
the famous Placebo effect---“With beliefs alone, they cured themselves.”(<Timeless Healing>)

What mediate between beliefs, expectations and actual performance in the real world?
---2 mechanism
1. motivation
2. the notion of consistency or congruence
We all have a mental schema of the world(what the world should be),and this is inside.
Things take place in the outside world.
The inside & The outside
Mind likes consistency or congruence between the inside and the outside, if not, we’ll experience a dissonance(not feeling good).
---Either change the reality or change or mind.
When there is a dissonance, the first thing we can do is to update the schema.
The second, ignore or discard the external information.
The third,seek confirmation(these two backup the schema)
The fourth, change the reality.
Edison’s story---I believe and I’ll work even harder(most creative, also failed the most times)
Learn to fail, or fail to learn.

Setting goals
Short term goals are equally imporatnt to long term goals.
Pessimists:short-realistic----long-realistic
Optimists:short-unrealistic----long:realistic
Pes are too realistic that they have low levels of belief, they don’t think they’ll do well.
Opt can learn from mistakes, until they bring the unrealistic reality to the realistic, to match their beliefs, in long terms they succeed.
There’re also detached(blind) optimists
So how can we tell from the realistic and the unrealistic?
Believe and at the same time realize the reality.

Do high expectations lead to disappointment?
William James:self-esteem=achievements/expectations
High expectations will hurt our self-esteem.
Last time we talked about the ups and downs, and there’s a base level.
For one with higher expectations, his or her base level increases.

/8/8 lesson7

How can we raise that base level?
coping(base level going up, not around a parellel line)

how can we be an optimist?
1. take action, to put ourselves on the line.
Constantly prasing will hurt self-esteem, hurt the motivation of students
We should be more discerning with praise, and praise in right way.
Not to dare is to lose oneself. Give ourselves an opportuinity to fail.
2. imagination or visualization.
When we see something, there’re certain neurons in our brain that are firing, they take the shape of it. Even if we close our eyes, we can still see it.
When I’m imaging success, I’m in fact fooling my mind.
---Subconscious mind doesn’t know the difference between the real thing and the imaginary thing.
If I imagine success, and the mind doesn’t like inconsistencies,it will bring up the external reality to match this internal schema(the imagination is not just about the result, but also the process).
Best example---Martin Luther King<I have a dream>
3.congnitive therapy(most effective therapeutic intervention)
Basic premise:thoughts drive emotion
We should firstly make a change in the level of congnition(restore rationality).
3 “M”s(irrational thought, distort of the reality)
Magnify(exaggerate what happens, over generalize)
Minimize( “tunnel vision”---only care about the minority)
Making up(personalize or blame,emotional reasoning)

Focus
Change our focus, change the questions,and change the reality.
The benefit-finder focus on what works, looks on the bright side of life,finds the miracle in the common.
Congnitive reconstruction is about learning to interpret things optimistically.
Stuff happens, we can either let it pollute or make fertillizer out of it.
Much of what happens, we co-create with the reality.

/8/9 lesson 8and9

(leeson8)
Last time I told my story in two perspectives: fault-finder and benefit-finder
The difference between them is that the benefit-finder understand that it’s possible to make the best of things that happen--- give himself the permission to fail,and things will turn out fine.
Those who perceive benefits of the trauma were physically and psychologically healthier.

The media does focus to the great extent on the negative.
But the media doesn’t just report reality as it is, it highlights certain aspects of reality(bias towards the negative).
Media creates cognitive distortions and actually make us become pessimists.
We need to correct for that, and to counter.

We need to realize there’s always something real to appreciate.
Single sentence of appreciation can give us strength