Positive Psychology and Mental Health: Solving Problems of Positive Psychology from A New Perspective

Abstract

Positive psychology tries to help people find happiness, hope, and life satisfaction within people’s lives. However, the approach of positive psychology might be inadequate. To reach all the positive sides, there need to be more negative sides to work with positive psychology because people may not have an accurate understanding of many mental disorders like obsessive-compulsive disorders or personality disorders. Telling them how problematic these mental disorders are might seem negative, but it will help people to have a better understanding of their own mental health. Forming the correct view of mental disorders will reduce stigma and help people with mental disorders reach out for help. Another problem with positive psychology is that many services related to this approach are driven by money, and the intentions might not be helpful for people who want to improve themselves. Possible causes of these problems might be related to the heavy money-related ideas led by Seligman, who is the most famous scientist in the area of positive psychology. Possible solutions might be related more to negative aspects of life in general because learning how to stay peaceful and happy during negative situations might be the only way to define true happiness. Based on the second wave of positive psychology, more attention is still needed to solve these problems by noticing how useful negative aspects of life are.