Thursday, 27 May 2010

Hope therapy? Obvious yet overlooked...

“People’s emotions often are determined by their expectations for the future,” explains David Feldman, assistant professor of counseling psychology at Santa Clara University in California and a practitioner of hope therapy. “People who believe they can move toward their goals will feel positive emotions; people without anything to work toward feel hopeless.”

Hope, as defined by psychologists, is the belief that you have the skills and energy to make your dreams a reality. But can a sunny buzzword be turned into a technique to help those feeling adrift, ineffective or uninspired? To paraphrase a hopeful refrain from Barack Obama’s presidential campaign: yes, it can. (more)

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