Kennon Sheldon || How to Be an Optimal Human - a podcast by Scott Barry Kaufman

“The happiest person is the person doing good stuff for good reasons.” 

— Kennon Sheldon

Dr. Kennon Sheldon is a psychologist at the University of Missouri who studies motivation, goals, and well-being, from both a self-determination theory and a positive psychology perspective. He has authored or co-authored multiple books, including “Optimal human being: An integrated multi-level perspective”. Dr. Sheldon has been cited more than 30,000 times, and in 2010, he was named one of the 20 most cited social psychologists.

In this wide-ranging episode we discuss:

• How Ken went from aspiring musician to leading research on goals


• Whether the pursuit of happiness is worth it


• Is happiness in your genes?


• The link between goals and happiness


• The what and why of motivated goal pursuit


• The basic needs of self-determination theory


• Deprivation vs. growth needs


• Self-concordance theory


• The link between values and happiness


• How much can we use science as a guide to values?


• Are there some ways of being more conducive to happiness than others?


• How to get in touch with your OVP (organismic valuing process)


• Marrying positive psychology and humanistic psychology


• The relationship between personal goals and personal projects


• How to know when to change your goals


• The good life: well-being or well-doing?

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