My Year of Practicing Positive Psychology

INTRODUCTION I have always loved writing. I still have the yellowing crumpled pages of a book I began when I was in the third grade; it was about a mischievous bunny and I had written the first four chapters. Unfortunately, I also can see the many erasure marks on the pages signaling my continuous editing that even then snatched away my joy and replaced it with anxiety and doubt – chapter five was never written. While I wasn’t aware at the time, this pattern was an early example of the excessive ‘nervousness’ that punctuated my life. Anxiety and depression accompanied me on my life’s journey, not that I had any intention of admitting this for many years, especially to myself. It was only in my thirties when I came to terms with the fact that I lived with mental illness. Since that time, I have accepted that the illness is part of me, but doesn’t define me. As an individual with a good job and a privileged life, I felt it was incumbent on me to share my story with others, putting a face to mental illness. In 2008 I began speaking with the Canadian Mental Health Association – Niagara Branch about my experiences. Similarly, I wanted the message to be one infused with hope of recovery. I investigated mental illness and the ways in which an individual can positively impact their own wellbeing, whether living with mental illness or not. A series of life events pointed me down a road that I could not have anticipated, beginning with being hired as a volunteer Mental Health Blogger with Healthy Minds Canada: (http://healthymindscanada.ca/author/sm/). My love of writing was combined with my passion for stigma reduction, and I started to share my stories, thoughts, and ideas with a broader audience. Interestingly, the very nature of blogging assisted me with my anxiety related to my writing abilities. When you need to produce a post ever couple of weeks, while maintaining a full life of work and volunteering, you cannot spend endless hours on revising your materials; blogging allowed me to say it, edit it once or twice, and release it to the world. A year later, I found myself ushering in a series of major life changes: the loss of the job I had worked at for more than 26 years; the subsequent decision to take the opportunity to return to school to complete my Master’s degree with an emphasis on applied positive psychology and mental health; the launching of my own blog site; the creation of my own consulting company; and a career change that saw me providing direct support to individuals living with severe and persistent mental illness. Whew! This book represents the realization of a dream that the little girl writing about a naughty rabbit all those years ago would have celebrated. I hope that I am able to inspire others to embrace ‘the upside of life’s transformations’ by choosing to engage in your own Fabulous Feats towards a life of practicing gratitude, cultivating optimism, practicing acts of kindness, nurturing social relationships, developing coping strategies, savouring life’s joys, committing to your goals and taking care of your mind, body, and spirit. Wishing you wellness, Susan Mifsud #FabFeats January 14, 2018