Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Thresholds That Truly Change Us I’ve crossed plenty of thresholds in my life. Graduations, promotions, marriage, a few plaques on the wall. All those moments came and went, all important in their own way. Despite the cultural significance, and that many of these events are dear to many...
Tag Archives: positive psychology
Living Richly Together: Perspective, Certainty, and the Ancient Problem We Keep Pretending Is New (Psychological Richness Part 4)
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction In the third part of this series, I teased the idea of psychological richness applied beyond the individual. If richness is a mechanism to pursue personal growth, perspective shift, and learning, what if it is applied on a larger scale? Can richness be a mechanism to approach...
Living Richly: Music, Travel, Discomfort, and Growth in Tuscany – Psychological Richness Part 3
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction Greetings and Salutations! Welcome to the third installment in the psychological richness series. In Part 1, I introduced Shigehiro Oishi’s concept of a psychologically rich life—one filled with interesting, perspective-changing experiences. In Part 2, I put on my skeptic hat and reengaged the theory: praised what works, critiqued what doesn’t,...
Psychological Richness Part 2: Biases, Blind Spots, and the Postmodern Trap
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction When we left off, we’d mapped out the three dimensions of a good life—happiness, meaning, and psychological richness—and how each complements the others. Happiness comforts. Meaning guides. Richness changes. But now it’s time to ask a harder question: what happens when we turn the microscope back on the model itself?...
Psychological Richness Part 1 – Defining the Good Life: Happiness, Meaning, and Richness
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction I’d like you to consider a deceptively simple question: what makes a life good? This isn’t a new question. Plato warned that an unexamined life wasn’t worth living. Aristotle proposed that the good life was one of virtue and purpose. The Epicureans, by contrast, believed happiness came from...
“That’s OK” Is Not OK: The Growth Mindset Rant (Part 1: The Individual)
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction “Some people are not good at [insert, whatever here]. And that’s ok.” The genesis of this post came from an interesting set of coincidences: That line came out of a podcast I listened to recently, and it nearly snuck past me on a quick listen, but something...
Simple Isn’t Easy…Yet Why Hard Things Get Easier (and How to Make That Happen)
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction Some things (2×2 tables for example) trigger an instant “old man shouts at clouds” reaction from my teenage daughter.I can be halfway into what I think is an insightful rant, cue the eyeroll. However, there is an inverse relationship between the rotational force vector of teenage eye-rolling and the...
In Praise of Doing Hard Things (Badly)
Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction I recently bought an online singing course. Yes — me. A guy who, in high school, was told (by his best friend no less) that his back-up vocals were so wildly off-key that it “actually worked as harmony.” Spoiler: it didn’t. That wasn’t a compliment. So why,...
The Resilience Rant: Reclaiming and Reframing Part 6
The Wrap-Up: What We’ve Learned, What Comes Next Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP The Rant Wasn’t Just a Rant Let’s face it—resilience needed a rebrand. Too many conversations about it either go Full Metal Jacket (“suck it up and drive on”), collapse into mushy platitudes (“just bounce back!”), or—on the flip side—dismiss resilience...
The Resilience Rant: Reclaiming and Reframing Part 5
What Actually Builds Resilience: Pressure, Process, and Purpose Christopher J. Colombo MD, CEC, CMC, CPP Introduction Let’s step back. Up to now, this series has focused on you—the individual reader. Your internal dialogue. Your emotional load. Your capacity to fall apart and rebuild. That work matters. But if resilience is real, it doesn’t stay static. If...