The pursuit of meaningfulness in life
Abstract
Human beings begin life as animals and remain tied throughout life to natural cycles of birth and death, eating and sleeping, reproduction, danger and safety, and more. Yet to this natural dimension of human life must be added a cultural one. Humans use their thinking capacity to transcend their immediate environment and their natural urges and responses. Thinking usually involves meaning, as in the use of language, symbols, and connections between concepts. The authors discuss the pursuit of the meaningfulness in life. The aim of positive psychology is to catalyze change in psychology from a preoccupation only with repairing the worst things in life to also building the best qualities in life. The field of positive psychology at the subjective level is about positive subjective experience: well-being and satisfaction (past); flow, joy, the sensual pleasures, and happiness (present); and constructive cognitions about the future--optimism, hope, and faith. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)