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.