So anger helps us defend threatened territory — it is just, and it is honest. Not only that — it is healthy. It is widely believed that bottling up a… - Martin E P Seligman

For the first time in history — because of technology and mass production and distribution, and for other reasons — large numbers of people are able to have a significant measure of choice and therefore of personal control over their lives. Not the least of these choices concerns our own habits of thinking. By and large, people have welcomed that control. We belong to a society that grants to its individual members powers they have never had before, a society that takes individuals’ pleasures and pains very seriously, that exalts the self and deems personal fulfillment a legitimate goal, an almost sacred right.

Enesekesksus on omane nukrusele, mitte heaolutundele.

The closer someone lived to someone who was lonely, the lonelier the second individual felt. The same was true for depression, but the blockbuster was about happiness. Happiness was even more contagious than loneliness or depression, and it worked across time. If person A’s happiness went up at time 1, person B’s — living next door — went up at time 2. And so did person C’s, two doors away, by somewhat less. Even person D, three doors away, enjoyed more happiness. This has significant implications for morale among groups of soldiers and for leadership. On the negative side, it suggests that a few sad or lonely or angry apples can spoil the morale of the entire unit. Commanders have known this forever. But the news is that positive morale is even more powerful and can boost the well-being and the performance of the entire unit. This makes the cultivation of happiness — a badly neglected side of leadership — important, perhaps crucial.