Higher scores represent higher levels of perceived stress, reflecting the degree to which respondents find their lives unpredictable or overloaded.

Positive psychology interventions addressing pleasure, engagement, meaning, positive relationships, and accomplishment increase well-being and ameliorate depressive symptoms: a randomized, placebo-controlled online study. It is often associated with self-confidence, self-esteem, and other concepts that marry “the self” with feeling content and happy. Each page is divided into two columns, with the left column containing the task or event and the right column containing any notes or additional details. Particularly, Buddhism supports “the cultivation of happiness, genuine inner transformation, deliberately selecting and focusing on positive mental states” ( Lama and Cutler, 2008). Consequently, today, several scholars argue that high levels of subjective well-being depend on a multi-dimensional perspective, which encompasses both hedonic and eudemonic components ( Huta and Ryan, 2010; Ryff and Boylan, 2016).

Items are grouped by four scales: the first, State Anger scale, refers to the emotional state characterized by subjective feelings and relies on three more subscales: Angry Feelings, Physical Expression of Anger, and Verbal Expression of Anger. Conversely, after the completion of the program, there were decreases in levels of trait anxiety, trait anger (including both the anger temperament and reaction subscales), and negative affect, showing a progressive reduction during the intervention. The aim of this study was to examine how several psychological measures, related to psychological well-being, changed among participants in parallel with course attendance and meditation practices.

Disclosure:This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you sign up or make a purchase I might get a small commission at no extra cost to you.These detailed, science-based exercises will help you or your clients identify sources of authentic happiness and strategies to boost wellbeing. Finally, while well-being and happiness are individual and subjective narratives of one's life as good and happy ( Bauer et al. e., the neuroscientific and psychological theories), instead only focusing on the contemplative practices, which were practiced extensively for the whole day, both individually and in group activities (for a full list of the contemplative practices and retreat activities, see Supplementary Material). We compare those psychological measures at the beginning of the course (T0) with its very end (P2), which coincided with the end of the second retreat. State of Writing; My Writing Way: These two blogs are full of writing guides to help you enhance your overall writing skills.

If you would like to change your settings or withdraw consent at any time, the link to do so is in our privacy policy accessible from our home page. Meditation and happiness: Mindfulness and self-compassion may mediate the meditation-happiness relationship. Participants were guided in the theory and practice of various contemplative exercises throughout the course pertaining to all the different themes. The course lasted 9 months and included three different modules (see Methods and Supplementary Material for all details), namely, seven weekends (from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon) dedicated to a wide range of specific topics, two 5-day long retreats, and several free activities at home during the entire period.Conversely, there were significantly lower levels of trait anxiety and trait anger (including both the anger temperament and reaction subscales) between the retreats (over a period of 4 months).