Well-Being Therapy

World Health Organization (WHO) defines health not only as “the absence of disease and infirmity; but as a complete well-being on physical, mental and social aspects”. Mental health studies have approached mental health as the absence of psychiatric diseases such as anxiety, depression, and schizophrenia. Nowadays, this approach became insufficient and mental health was attempted to be explained with various concepts such as happiness, pleasure, being positive, avoiding from pain, and feeling good. In this manner, the concept of psychological well-being has been raised [1-4]. Psychological well-being is defined briefly as the person’s self-realization and fulfilling his/her psychological functionality. Ryff & Keyes [5] have evaluated psychological wellbeing with the elements indicating psychological functionality, such as psychological well-being, meaningfulness of life, to be in good social relations and to have the dominion of their own lives [5]. Ryan & Deci [4] have addressed the concept of wellbeing in two main dimensions, satisfaction (pleasure) and happiness (eudaimonia) [4]. Therefore, the concept of well-being is a concept that addresses positive emotions rather than negative ones and the satisfaction that people get from the important things of their life. Obviously, the absence of well-being criteria affects the treatment negatively. Well-being therapy is based on Carol D. Ryff’s multidimensional model of psychological wellbeing, encompassing six dimensions: self-acceptance, positive relations with others, environmental mastery, purpose in life, personal growth and autonomy [2,6,7]. The key concepts of Ryff’s multidimensional model are as follows: