Optimism Psychology is a call to excellence for practitioners, coaches, clinicians, researchers, patients, clients, and the world.
OP is preceded by humanistic psychology and positive psychology. It is, in a sense, a third wave.
OP holds that the field of psychology is still emerging and much of the research is suggestive, not conclusive. And often what is called suggestive is actually speculative.
Psychology contains great uncertainty. OP accepts the enormous challenges presented by the massive grey areas in psychology.
OP does not disparage the “disease model,” or medical model, if and when the model works.
OP does not disparage self-help. Indeed, “Help thyself” may almost be a commandment when it comes to mental health and emotional fitness.
OP is deeply (and highly) purpose-oriented and value-driven. Op is rigorously focused on what works.
OP seeks the truth about, and strives for health, happiness, and harmony.
OP is pro-medicine, pro-psychiatry, pro-psychology, pro-science, pro-spirituality, with the understanding of historical abuses, contemporary bias, and hubris.
OP is not a department within a university, nor a field within psychology. It is an orientation. OP is an appropriate framework for developmental, clinical, social, counseling, cognitive, or other areas of psychology. OP accepts everything from psychoanalysis, to CBT, to contemporary developments in the coaching industry. It accepts eclecticism while acknowledging the dangers of arbitrary whimsy and self-insular practices.
OP values non-academic discoveries and inventions in the field of psychology.
OP is a patient, empirical theory of knowledge and action. It is an expansive, yet focused call to progress. It is an unabashed belief in individual and collective human potential. It is fundamentally hopeful and generous.
OP seeks revolution and acknowledges real change happens in increments and fits and starts.
OP is ambitious, seeking to apply itself to an individual’s pain, as well as global peace and conflict.
OP is psychology for the courageous, the compassionate, the open-minded, and the driven