Positive Psychology

משמעות החיים- מאייל יפרח

משמעות החיים- מאייל יפרח

אייל יפרח הי"ד אחד מ- 3 הנערים שנחטפו בחודש יוני 2014 כותב על משמעות חמש שעות וחצי לפני העלייה לרכב החטיפה.   "משמעות". זו המילה כיצד אדם יכול לחיות את חייו כאשר כל כולו עסוק רק בלשרוד? בין אם זה לשרוד על החיים כשמצד שני יש מוות, ובין אם זה 'לשרוד' במובן של רדיפה כל הזמן אחרי עצמך, לחפש את עצמך מאחורי מסיבות, תרבות, הנאה, מקומות שבהם תמצא רק את ההופעה הבזויה שיכולה להיות לך. ההופעה שבה אדם קושר את עצמו לכלוב של זהב! כיצד אדם יכול להרשות לעצמו לחיות ללא שום מטרה שהיא…Read more
The Growth Mindset

The Growth Mindset

Over 30 years ago, Dr Carol Dweck coined the term fixed mindset and growth mindset. Not surprisingly, people who have a fixed mindset do not change so much in their abilities. People with a growth mindset, meaning that they believe they can change and grow, will have much higher levels of accomplishments.Research shows that we can teach our brain to create new connections and strengthen existing ones. People who have a growth mindset behave differently. Many people have a mix of different mindsets. For example, one person may believe that they can continue…Read more
Three Ps battling the three Ms

Three Ps battling the three Ms

In Tal Ben Shachar's lecture in positive psychology, he discussed the three M's that can be detrimental when dealing with a situation:  Magnifying, Minimizing , Making up. We tend to magnify a tough situation and make it to be worse than what it is. Sometimes we minimize the importance of something and sometimes we imagine things to be worse than what it is. To combat it we have three P's: Permission, Positive reframing and Perspective Permission to be human- It is important to embrace what we feel. We should not deny our feelings,…Read more
Importance In Routine

Importance In Routine

Leo Babauta presented a very interesting talk titled, Mindfulness: The Key to Habit Change. He stressed how important it is to convert our goals into habits. When we focus on goals, on the future, we often get stuck in: procrastination, rationalisation and self talk. We need to put our goals into our routine. For example, every sunday morning we will exercise before breakfast as part of the routine. Or every wed night we will write in our journal. The idea is we pick a goal and force it to become a habit, so…Read more
mother-daughter connection

mother-daughter connection

This past week I gave over a workshop designed for Mothers and Daughters, who were learning together in preparation for the daughters bat mitsvah. Oftentimes the relationships which are most important and special to us, can be taken for granted. Just as it is important for us to work on ourself, on self actualization, it is important for us to work on our relationships with other people, particularly ones who are important to us. Tal Ben Shachar, Professor at Harvard University, recommended writing a letter to someone that includes detailing why the relationship…Read more
positive psychology

positive psychology

Tal Ben Shachar gives a course in Harvard on Positive Psychology. His course is the most popular course with over 700 students attending. Tal explained that his course is popular, not because he is so dynamic and outgoing, but rather the subject matter is so relevant to people nowadays. There are many studies and methodologies dealing with helping depression but not so many on how to be happy (the ratio is 31:1). The absence of depression does not mean there will be happiness. Having general unhappiness is something that plagues many people nowadays.…Read more
positive psychology

positive psychology

I took a course this year in positive psychology, a new and popular field. Positive psychology is the "scientific study of what makes life most worth living" or the study of happiness. One topic explored in the course was the myths of happiness. Happiness seems to be something everyone is constantly striving for, and yet seems almost unattainable. One of the problems with seeking happiness constantly is our unrealistic expectations regarding how to be happy, as well as our definition of happiness. Many people equate happiness as the feeling as being on a…Read more