Best Of

Best Of

I am a practitioner of Positive Psychology. I focus on strengths and positive experiences, rather than weaknesses and traumatic experiences. As part of this practice, I often start a session by asking my coaching clients: “What is the best thing that happened to you or that you experienced during the week?“

Today I present a series of prompts that I use to elicit positivity from my clients. You can try these prompts yourself. I promise that if you practice answering these each week, you will feel better, stronger, and more optimistic. (I include my own responses.)

1. What is the best purchase you have made recently? (For me it is a pair of Minnetonka, flannel lined moccasins to keep my feet warm during the winter.)

2. What is the best way that you have found to exercise?(For me it is asking my neighbor,  Bill Murrell, who is a personal trainer, to work with me on strengthening and stretching.)

3. What is the best new food you have tried? (Soy ice cream…it is tasty but too cold.)

4. What is your best new tech toy? (A combination camera and microphone for zooming.)

5. What was your best reunion? (A gathering of family and friends for a shower for Katrina Pasick who is expecting a baby in the next few weeks.)

6. What is the best news story of the week? (New infrastructure package passed…I hope it fixes our road.)

7. What is the best music you are listening to? (For me it is a mixture of the old and new: Rediscovering Tom Petty‘s WildFlowers album and discovering an album by War on Drugs.)

8. What is the best TV you are watching? (Tie between “I May Destroy You”, “Succession”, and “Curb Your Enthusiasm”…especially  the cow show.)

9. What is the best magazine article you read? (An article about the adoption business, called “Family Business” in the New Yorker.)

10. What is the best party you have attended? (Frank Ascione‘s birthday party, where he asked us all to give him advice for old age.)

11. What is the best game you have played? (Up and down the ladder, I played with my family including my mother-in-law, Jean, who will be turning 99 next month.)

12. What is the best gift? (Getting to start coaching with some fascinating new clients  from diverse fields including healthcare, real estate shipping, higher education, and science.)

13. What is your best new miracle medical procedure? (A partial cornea transplant which has restored my vision.)

14. What are the best books you are reading? (”Talking to Strangers” by Malcolm Gladwell.)

15. What is the best quote of the month? (From Malcolm Gladwell: “To assume the best about another is the trait that has created modern society. Those occasions when our trusting nature gets violated are tragic. But the alternative – to abandon trust as a defense against predation and deception – is worse.)

16. Who are the best people connected to you? (You, my friends.)