Making Happy People, Paul Martin
Making Happy People: The Nature of Happiness and Its Origins in Childhood - Paul Martin, Fourth Estate, 272 pages (February 21, 2005). ISBN:0007127065
| Title & Author: | Making Happy People Paul Martin |
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Paul Martin took a PhD in behavioural biology at Cambridge University, then pursued a Harkness Fellowship in the Department of Psychiatry at Stanford University. His previous books include The Sickening Mind and Counting Sheep.
In Making Happy People, Paul Martin suggest happiness comes from three areas: pleasure, absence of displeasure, and satisfaction with one's lot. Paul Martin uses straightforward prose to present an encyclopaedic account of the philosophical, psychological and scientific roots of happiness.
As the title suggests, Paul Martin suggests that childhood experiences have a major impact on happiness. But, although this seems like common-sense, other authors like Martin Seligman in Authentic Happiness have suggested that childhood experiences are less important than genetics, current experience, and finding thoughtful ways of solving your problems. Still, even if Seligman is right, we surely want to make children's current experience happy and teach them thoughtful ways to handle their problems. Also, such contradictions should not detract from the scientific basis that makes this book far superior to the average self-help offering. The reader can take on board the more solid scientific findings, and leave shakier results to be investigated by future research.
Paul Martin's main grindstone in Making Happy People is the equation of happiness with success. He shares the views of Seligman and other careful happiness researchers that success is no guarantee of happiness, indeed he provides much evidence that the converse is more likely to be true. In this vein, he suggests promoting happiness in children through recognition of their needs, rather than pushing them to succeed.
You don't need to be a parent to find this book useful, it has messages for
the child in us all.
- Making Happy People: Paul Martin is