Accessing Your Inner HERO to Activate the Pillars of Well-being
What are the pillars of well-being?
Science has learned that your well-being can have a permanent effect on your physical and mental health. In life, there are four types of capital that contribute to well-being: financial (what you have), human (what you know), social (who you know), and psychological (who you are).
What you have relates to the material resources we have at our disposal, like money and tangible assets, or material goods.
What you know could be your knowledge, skills, training, ideas, or education.
Who you know through social capital refers to our relationships, friends, and network of connections.
Who you are is psychological capital, which is what the positivity effect is all about.
To shift well-being in a positive direction, there are four different emotional skills needed. Collectively, these four resources are known as psychological capital, or psy-cap, which consists of:
Hope: Choosing to believe you are in control of the future, to act with agency
Empowerment: Capitalizing on past successes, to build confidence
Resilience: Cultivating a flexible mindset in the present, to build readiness and courage
Optimism: Converting how you explain the past and expect the future, to gain perspective and certainty
These skills are sometimes referred to collectively as HERO. Each of them relies on the essential skill of self-regulation. Note that I have chosen to use the word “Empowerment” rather than the original E proposed in HERO, “self-Efficacy”—a belief in one’s capacity to have an influence in a situation, typically their sense of confidence. Because empowerment is considered a predictor of self-efficacy, it is an important theme for us to consider in terms of overall well-being.
Accessing your inner HERO is crucial to cultivate hope, facilitate empowerment, develop resiliency, and promote optimism. We all have these resources, but they are often untapped because they have not been given the emotional nutrients needed to thrive. The key to unlocking the power of psychological capital is learning self-regulation, which is regulating your perception. Perception can directly change your emotions and your experience into something more positive.
