Coping With Loss: The Summers Story

FM got in touch with Psychology 1504: Positive Psychology lecturer Tal Ben-Shahar to get some happiness tips for former tennis partner and soon-to-be ex-University President Lawrence H. Summers. Ben-Shahar suggests a three-prong approach to beating the resignation blues.

1) “He will likely be feeling upset, disappointed and sad. He should give himself permission to be human­­—to experience whatever he is experiencing and accept it as natural and human,” says Ben-Shahar.

2) Ben-Shahar recommends that Summers should study Harvard psychology Professor Daniel T. Gilbert’s research, which found that humans possess a remarkable ability to overcome disappointing life events. Nothing—even being forced out of the presidency of the world’s leading university—is as bad as it first seems.

3) Lar-Bear should reflect on his experiences as president, says Ben-Shahar, and recall the high points of his tenure (bopping with eager freshmen in Annenberg) and looking for opportunities to use what he has learned in the future (next year’s Ice Cream Bash).

If Summers is still blue, Ben-Shahar has saved a seat in Sanders with Summers’ name on it. “Audit [Psychology] 1504 and do the response papers,” he recommends.

“He made mistakes,” says Ben-Shahar, who also teaches Psychology 1508: Psychology of Leadership, “but he was willing to learn from them.” Ben-Shahar says that anti-Summers faculty members “were not asking for a leader, they were asking for a spineless conformist, a pseudo-leader.”

Ben-Shahar offered Summers an open invitation to lecture about lessons he learned while president. Now that’s positive.