The Meaning of Life: Our Keys to Happiness

What do achievement and joy have in common? Both are positive orientations, motivational keys to living life in ways that are, at heart, very upbeat and constructive. Achievement stresses productively focused activity, and joy inspires insightfully focused celebration. So, achievement is much more clearly productive in its moment, while joy supports being celebrative about key outcomes and opportunities. Certainly, achievement and joy are keys to an overarching sense of happiness, based on a satisfyingly well-lived and meaningful life. Yet just as surely, there are many more keys to meaningful living, and overarching happiness as well. Positive orientations are our inborn ways of appreciating life. Upbeat and constructive at heart, they motivate us to move forward in life in ways that are generally productive. Examples of positive orientations include goodness and love, as well as language and thinking. Currently, nowhere else are they all so well organized and presented. Each positive orientation--of fifty--is explained in a carefully worded paragraph, and grouped together with closely related orientations in nine developmental categories. In concert, as key sources of meaningful happiness, these positive orientations suggest the very broad range of appreciation and motivation that we find in humanity as a whole. This is how we find meaning in life, and thus, happiness in life.