PERMA is the model for wellbeing that we use at BHPS. It is based on research and scientific evidence shared by Martin Seligman.
According to Seligman, the acronym, PERMA, makes up five important building blocks of well-being and happiness:
- Positive emotions – feeling good
- Engagement – being completely absorbed in activities
- Relationships – being authentically connected to others
- Meaning – purposeful existence
- Achievement – a sense of accomplishment and success
and underpinned by the Character Strengths
Positive Emotions
Positive emotions are among the many components that make up happiness and well-being, and one of the more obvious layers of happiness. It’s good to know the difference between pleasure and enjoyment. While pleasure relates to satisfying bodily needs like hunger, thirst, or taking a long sleep after a tough day, enjoyment comes from intellectual stimulation and creativity. Enjoyment can be as simple as playing a fun game with friends in the playground at lunch time. Enjoyment also involves being intellectually challenged and standing up to it. For example, puting a jigsaw puzzle together, which requires concentration and careful figuring out, can lead to smiles of contentment and enjoyment.
Positive emotions are good for us because they stretch the imagination. When we do something they enjoy or find interesting, we are more likely to persevere in the face of challenges, and spontaneously search for more creative solutions and opportunities. Positive emotions can also help undo negative ones; Generally, we are likely to do more of the activities we find stimulating and that bring enjoyment, and the effects last longer than those that generate short-lived pleasure.
Engagement
We’ve all had the experience of becoming so absorbed in work or in reading a book that we completely lose sense of time or forget an appointment. Achieving this state of flow or total engagement is natural, especially when people are involved in activities they love and are good at, such as dancing, playing sport, or pursuing creative activities and hobbies.
Although engagement in enjoyable activities comes relatively easy to most children, it is still important to have opportunities to take part in activities that offer experiences of engagement or flow. Such opportunities might involve putting together jigsaw puzzles, drawing and coloring, playing with toys, or practicing ballet or a musical instrument. The fact that such activities stretch the intellectual and emotional limits and endurance, as well as require concentration and effort, is important.
Relationships
Happiness and psychological health are inextricably linked with close, meaningful, and intimate relationships. Fleeting social relationships with strangers as well as longstanding ones with peers, siblings, parents, extended family, and friends are all sources of positive emotions and support. According to research, one important function of social networks is that they can spread happiness, cheer and laughter like wild fire.
Meaning
True happiness comes from creating and having meaning in life, rather than from the pursuit of pleasure and material wealth. Loving someone and being loved is a meaningful phenomenon, for example, because such acts inspire people to live for, and take care of, someone other than the self. Living a meaningful life is, in essence, related to attaching oneself to something larger than oneself. It instills the sense that there is a larger purpose to life, and being a part of it confers meaning. Doing chores, caring for the environment and helping others within the broader community are some examples of taking part in activities that go beyond merely living for oneself. These activities bring fulfillment and meaning that enhance well-being.
Accomplishment
Having explicit goals in life, even small ones like reading for an hour everyday, and making efforts to achieve them are important to well-being and happiness. Achievement helps to build self-esteem and provides a sense of accomplishment. It also strengthens self-belief.
The mere effort one puts into reaching a specific goal in itself harbors satisfaction. Importantly, setting goals and putting in the necessary efforts to achieve them are just as important as actually reaching them; it is OK not to succeed the first time.
