Flourish: A New Understanding of Happiness and Wellbeing: The practical guide to using positive psychology to make you happier and healthier

by Martin E.P. Seligman

First, students learn the ABC model: how beliefs (B) about an adversity (A)—and not the adversity itself— cause the consequent (C) feelings. This is a point of major insight for students: emotions don’t follow inexorably from external events but from what you think about those events, and you can actually change what you think.

Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. —Preamble to the Constitution of the World Health Organization, 1946

the skills of enjoying positive emotion, being engaged with the people you care about, having meaning in life, achieving your work goals, and maintaining good relationships are entirely different from the skills of not being depressed, not being anxious, and not being angry.