POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

Martin Seligman’s most recent theory of wellbeing contains the new component of “accomplishment”. It’s a broad category, covering everything from achievement, competence and success to progress towards goals and mastery at the highest possible level. These concepts have been studied individually in psychology for decades – but collecting them together under the heading “accomplishment” within positive psychology is new.

Positive psychologists don’t always agree on definitions of happiness and wellbeing, nor what should be included in wellbeing theory and what should be left out. Seligman’s original model of “authentic happiness” consisted of three components: positive emotions, engagement and meaning. In the intervening years, scientific research and debate inspired him to revise this by adding two further components to wellbeing theory, relationships and accomplishment.

Accomplishment is included as one of the facets of wellbeing because like the other components, it is something that humans pursue for its own sake. Even though we all know people who are high achievers for extrinsic reasons, such as increased power, status or pay, accomplishment per se is intrinsically motivating. Nurturing accomplishment on its own or together with any of the other four facets, says Seligman, will lead to higher wellbeing.

There are various techniques in psychology that can be used to increase your sense of accomplishment. One of these is known as the “accomplishment anchor”. With this, you can use your past successes to give you confidence, spur you on to greater achievements and give you a boost of positive emotion when you need a little psychological pick-me-up. This is an idea adapted from positive psychologist Barbara Fredrickson.

How to increase your level of goal achievement

According to Seligman’s theory, achievement can be summarised as follows:

Achievement = skill x effort

He suggests that the skill and effort elements have certain characteristics which are needed for higher achievement:

. Speed of thought. According to wellbeing theory, if you have already acquired a lot of relevant skills or knowledge about a particular task, you won’t have to waste brain power on the basics. This leaves you more able to think quickly, and with time left over to devote to planning, checking and being creative. These, of course, are the hallmarks of performance excellence.

. Rate of learning. Clearly the faster you learn, the more information and knowledge you can acquire per hour spent on the task. In terms of achievement and accomplishment, this will also put you ahead of the game.

Becoming an expert

In terms of effort, research by psychologist K. Anders Ericsson and colleagues suggests that it takes a minimum of 10 years (or roughly 10,000 hours) of deliberate practice in any subject to become an expert. By “deliberate practice”, Ericsson doesn’t mean practising those things which you already know how to do, he means putting sustained effort into the things you can’t do very well, or even at all. In other words, in order to become an expert, you must put yourself outside of your traditional comfort zone, which requires substantial self-motivation and self-discipline.

Since very little is currently known about how to increase our speed of thought and rate of learning, the one thing we can all do to improve our rate of accomplishment is to spend more time on deliberate practice.

Becoming an expert in a particular field, Ericsson and colleagues recommend two tips:

. Find a coach or mentor who can provide the level of challenge and critical feedback necessary to keep improving your skills.

. Spend time observing a “master” at work, then utilise or use similar techniques that were used.   

The role of competence

Competence is one of the psychological facets which increases self-motivation, goal achievement, and wellbeing. When it’s accompanied by perseverance, competence makes a good recipe for accomplishment at any level, big or small. When psychologists speak of competence, it implies being confident and effective in what we do.

There are several strategies you can adopt to increase your competence in a particular field. One way is to get regular constructive feedback about how you are performing. The feedback might be inherent in the activity: you can tell straight away whether or not you’re playing the piano or playing a game of squash well, for example. Or you may have to wait for results or seek feedback from someone else.

Another way to increase your competence in relation to your goal is to find ways to improve your skill-set. You could do this by gradually making the goal more challenging, so that you have to strive a bit harder every time you do it. People naturally shy away from stepping outside their comfort zone, but remember, this really is the only way to learn new skills. When feeling uncomfortable, remind yourself that this is a sign that you have the opportunity to learn something new.

A third method is to undertake specific skills training. You might do this in your own spare time or through an organisation. As Ericsson suggests, you could find a role-model to emulate.

Those are some of the ways that will help to improve your competence, and increase the probability that you will tread the accomplishment pathway to wellbeing. Effort and persistence are so essential for goal achievement.

Indeed, research in psychology suggests that regardless of innate talent, considerable effort is required to become an expert. Continual practise is a key ingredient.