Discover Your Strengths in 15 minutes

Stereotypically us humans are are obsessed with deficits and disorders. To help counter this prevailing tendency towards the negative, psychologists Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman wanted to create a Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Positive strengths and virtues. Surely it would be useful, they thought, if people could use a questionnaire to identify their strengths as human beings?

What they came up with was the ‘Values in Action Inventory of Strengths’ (VIA-IS). I suggest you take this. But first a bit of background so that you can understand what it means.

To create the VIA, Peterson and Seligman (2005) came up with 6 virtues and 24 strengths. The core virtues are those identified by philosophers, religious thinkers and others as being central to a ‘good character’ – these are the six main headings in the list below. The 24 character strengths, meanwhile, are those characteristics of individuals that contribute towards these virtues. These are listed under the virtue to which they contribute.

Knowledge (virtue)
Creativity (strength)
Curiosity
Love of learning
Perspective (wisdom)
Open-mindedness
Courage (virtue)
Bravery (strength)
Persistence
Integrity
Vitality
Humanity
Capacity to love and receive love
Kindness
Social intelligence
Justice
Citizenship
Fairness
Leadership
Temperance
Forgiveness/mercy
Modesty/humility
Prudence
Self-regulation
Transcendence
Appreciation of excellence and beauty
Gratitude
Hope
Humour
Spirituality
Take the survey

The VIA-IS can be taken at http://www.viacharacter.org/survey/Account/Register a site run by the VIA institute. You need to register and then the site will save your results so you can always revisit and check your strengths.

Once you have registered with the site, you’ll see there are three different versions: the full survey for adults (240 questions), the full survey for those between 8 and 17 years old (198 questions) and a brief version (24 questions). I’d highly recommend putting in the 15 minutes or so it will take to complete the full survey. While the brief survey is a good indicator, you’ll get much more accurate results from the full survey.

The VIA-IS questionnaire asks you questions that access each of the strengths. It then gives you your top 5 ‘signature strengths’, along with all the other strengths in order, from strongest to weakest. You might be surprised about some of your signature strengths – I certainly was.

More on strengths and virtues

Included in the results is a short description of what each strength means. There is also more information on some of these strengths and virtues on the VIA site – these are linked in the list above. You can also compare your own top 5 strengths to averages obtained by others.

Read Full Post »

Are you a Dandelion or an Orchid?

Most humans have genes that make them as hardy as dandelions: able to take root and survive almost anywhere.

A few, however, are more like the orchid: fragile and fickle, but capable of blooming spectacularly if given greenhouse care.

A provocative new theory in genetics asserts that the genes that give us the most trouble as a species, causing behaviors that are self-destructive and antisocial, also underlie humankind’s phenomenal adaptability and evolutionary success. Orchids may be hypersensitive to their environment, have difficulty with certain foods, types of people, situations. This may make it very difficult for them to function well and fully, to thrive as human beings.

Therefore with a bad environment and poor parenting, orchid children can end up depressed, drug-addicted, or in jail—but with the right environment and good parenting, their sensitivities and vulnerabilities can help them grow up to be society’s most creative, successful, and happy people. These orchid people may have an innate sense for the subtle issues that confound humanity and find mediums to express these issues in a way that strikes at humanities heart.

Read Full Post »

CREATIVITY IN NATURE – COSTA SMERALDA OLBIA

Read Full Post »

Intelligence : Pay Attention to Body Language – Understand more

  Some people may seem like mind readers, but very often they are just better at guessing what people around them are thinking. This is largely because they are more aware of non verbal signals.

Researchers believe that the ability to read faces is a human skill that is acquired through evolution. Understanding groups and tribes has been extremely important to survival got prehistoric man. Being excluded from a group could mean death or starvation, hence humans became very good at evaluating facial expressions and social cues.

The same is true for people who have faced regular rejection by peer groups. They are generally able to recognise who is and who is not being genuine simply by scrutinising their smiles.

Quick Tips

• To become a better reader of body language look at the eyes of people when they smile. If the muscles around their eyes crinkle, its the real deal. A false smile only requires you move your mouth.
• Rapid swallowing or blinking and restricted arm movements also signifies dishonesty.
• The book ‘Reading People’ by Jo-Ellen Dimitrius and Mark Mazzarella is a wonderful guide to understanding body language.

Read Full Post »

Become a good listener, hear more

In order to become more intuitive, you need to actively pay attention to what others and your environment are telling you. The more information you take in, the better informed you become when making decisions.

To prove this point, scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development based in Berlin, interviewed ordinary people who had invested in the stock market simply by choosing stocks or companies that they has heard about. The scientist made portfolios of these stocks and compared their success to similar sized stock purchases made by industry experts. After six months, the portfolios put together by the lay group earned more money than the ones done by the experts. Researchers theorise that the rookies probably chose stocks they’d heard good things about.

Quick Tip

Tutors advocate this strategy when you are stuck on a test or work problem. Go with the solution that resonates the most with you even if you cannot pinpoint why it feels right. If you are a better listener, finding things that resonate with you becomes more defined.

To become a better listener, ask yourself the following questions:
‘How often do you cut people off?’
‘How frequently are you trying to get your point across rather than listening?’
If you are guilty of doing the above too often, then you can decrease this habit by maintaining eye contact with the person you are speaking to. You are less likely to interrupt somebody you are staring at. May prove difficult on teleconference calls.

Not interrupting and focusing on the speaker will help you really hear everything that is being said. Over time it will help you pick up on things that others don’t – giving you the information edge.

Read Full Post »

The Power Of Intention

  

“Will a self and thou shall become a self” Nietzche

Read Full Post »

Are we too clever to create?

Picasso said and I quote: “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.”

From the perspective of brain development, Picasso maybe on to something. The frontal lobes are the last brain areas to fully develop and are considered our control center and home to our personality and ego.

The frontal lobes and ego : how do they relate?

Information processing occurs in various brain areas, like the visual cortex (what we have seen) or auditory cortex (what we have heard). Responses to this incoming information are carried out by yet other brain areas such as the primary motor cortex (voluntary movement – i.e. run away from a lion in front of you) or Broca’s speech area (respond verbally (speak) to alert others of an impending danger).

The role of the frontal lobe is to monitor the functions of these areas. Information coming in from the visual cortex passes to the frontal lobe, which may halt the response i.e. running away from the lion (effected by the motor cortex). This occurs because a second piece of information gets added into the equation by the frontal lobe, that the lion is actually on a cinema screen, hence it is only an image and not an actual lion. The frontal lobe therefore enables some voluntary control over automated behaviours. The rest of the brain and body seems to function almost automatically.

As the frontal lobe develops, our ability to voluntarily control behaviour and responses seem to increase.  Hence we have the ability to control how we want others to see us. This is how the ego develops. The frontal lobe enables us to navigate societal challenges and adapt our behaviours. The better we are at doing this, the more successful we will be perceived. But can we become too good at this? Can we become too controlled? Every talent comes with a tradeoff. When we repress our urge to act spontaneously, we also repress the urge to create.

Quick Tip

The way around this may be to learn to control our frontal lobe function.

The first step is learning to accept our mistakes. In fact when we learn to celebrate our mistakes, with no fear of appearing ‘the fool’ – we may finally be getting somewhere with frontal lobe control. And we too may remain the child-like artists forever.

Read Full Post »

Simple Philosophy

Simply deal with the situation as it is, rather then waste time with why, what and how???

Read Full Post »

Intuition versus Rational

“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.” ~ Albert Einstein

Read Full Post »

Why Do We Need to Lay Blame?

As humans, we tend to do all we can to suppress negative emotions. We do this because we don’ t want to

• focus on what scares us
• unleash our own anger
• admit we are wrong
• be responsible for sorting things out

We therefore blame others. By transferring our negative thoughts about ourselves onto others, we can justify our own behaviour.

We have to start forgiving ourselves for being human and making mistakes because there is not a human alive who does not make mistakes.

If you keep doing what you have always done, you will keep getting what you have always got.

You have to change in order to get something different.  Only you can change you.

Lets make it our motto to “Stop Blaming and Start Living”. Take responsibility for your actions.

Read Full Post »