I'm trying to broaden the scope of positive psychology well beyond the smiley face. Happiness is just one-fifth of what human beings choose to do.
Martin SeligmanRead
The dirty little secret of both clinical psychology and biological psychiatry is that they have completely given up on the notion of cure.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that both clinical psychology and biological psychiatry have abandoned the pursuit of curing mental illnesses.
Martin Seligman highlights a concerning trend in the fields of clinical psychology and biological psychiatry, where the focus has shifted away from finding cures for mental illnesses. Instead, these disciplines may have settled into managing symptoms rather than striving for complete recovery, which raises important questions about the effectiveness and goals of mental health care.
Themes
Mental HealthPsychologyCureTreatmentSymptoms
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about modern mental health practices, this quote can illustrate how the focus on symptom management may overlook the individual's potential for recovery.
More from Martin Seligman
All quotes βOne of my worries about America is the epidemic of depression we've been in. One of the possibilities about that is that the 'I' gets bigger and bigger, and the 'we' gets smaller and smaller.
Martin SeligmanRead
The belief that we can rely on shortcuts to happiness, joy, rapture, comfort, and ecstasy, rather than be entitled to these feelings by the exercise of personal strengths and virtues, leads to legions of people who, in the middle of great wealth, are starving spiritually.
Martin SeligmanRead
I believe psychology has done very well in working out how to understand and treat disease. But I think that is literally half-baked. If all you do is work to fix problems, to alleviate suffering, then by definition you are working to get people to zero, to neutral.
Martin SeligmanRead
The good life is using your signature strengths every day to produce authentic happiness and abundant gratification.
Martin SeligmanRead
Perhaps the single most robust fact across many surveys is that married people are happier than anyone else.
Martin SeligmanRead
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If we think about emotion this way - as outside-in, not inside out - it is possible to understand how some people can have an enormous amount of influence over others. Some of us, after all, are very good at expressiing emotions and feelings, which means that we are far more emotionally contagious than the rest of us.
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There is a psychological technique which makes it possible to interpret dreams, and ... if that procedure is employed, every dream reveals itself as a psychical structure which has a meaning and which can be inserted at an assignable point in the mental activities of waking life.
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If we understand the mechanisms and motives of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing it In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.
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There is no such thing as a pure introvert or extrovert. Such a person would be in the lunatic asylum.
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We live in a world where most people still subscribe to the belief that shame is a good tool for keeping people in line. Not only is this wrong, but itβs dangerous. Shame is highly correlated with addiction, violence, aggression, depression, eating disorders, and bullying.
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Few of us can accurately gauge how we will feel tomorrow or next week. That's why when you go to the supermarket on an empty stomach, you'll buy too much, and if you shop after a big meal, you'll buy too little.
Daniel GilbertRead