Perma: 10 Evidence-Based Coaching Practices

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Perma, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

About 2 minutes

Try it here: name one thing for each PERMA pillar

PERMA has five pillars of well-being. Write one thing from your life for each, to see which pillar is thinnest right now.

Write one line for each pillar, in order.

Or do it with Io instead.

Practices that may help

  1. Seligman’s PERMA Model, Made Practical
    Martin Seligman’s PERMA model identifies five pillars of well-being: Positive Emotions, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment. Unlike happiness models that treat well-being as a single variable, PERMA argues these five elements are each intrinsically valued and each independently improvable. Several PERMA-targeted interventions have randomized-trial support; others are mechanistically grounded with less direct evidence.
  2. The Perennial Philosophy, Made Practical
    The perennial philosophy, synthesized by Aldous Huxley from mystic and contemplative traditions across cultures, identifies a common inner core: a divine or ultimate ground underlying all existence, knowable through direct experience; an inner nature in humans capable of that knowing; and an ethics of love and compassion as the natural expression of that realization. It is not a scientific theory but a philosophical synthesis — its practices draw on contemplative traditions whose psychological effects have increasing observational and some experimental support.
  3. Build meaning through contribution rather than achievement (meaning pillar)
    Orient your work toward what it does for others, not just what it earns you.
    Seligman’s PERMA Model, Made Practical
  4. Run a PERMA audit of your current well-being
    Rate each of the five PERMA pillars to find which is currently limiting your overall flourishing.
    Seligman’s PERMA Model, Made Practical
  5. Audit your life against PERMA
    Check well-being across all five pillars — emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, accomplishment.
    Positive Psychology, Made Practical
  6. Hold impermanence without grief
    Practice keeping the awareness of impermanence in the background — not a meditation on loss but a light on presence.
    The Last Time Meditation
  7. Plan in seasons, not permanent allocations
    Think of burner settings as seasonal, not fixed — recalibrate at defined intervals.
    Four Burners Theory: Making Peace With Trade-Offs
  8. Sensation-level impermanence noting
    In meditation, track how quickly every physical sensation arises and passes away.
    Anicca: Working Practically with Impermanence
  9. Contemplation of impermanence
    Hold steadily that everything you have — including the people you love — is on loan and temporary.
    Premeditatio Malorum, in Depth
  10. Mating in Captivity: Sustaining Desire in Long-Term Relationships
    Esther Perel argues that the conditions that make love secure — closeness, familiarity, predictability — are structurally at odds with the conditions that sustain erotic desire — mystery, distance, and the thrill of unpredictability. Sustaining desire is not about technique but about holding the paradox: you can be deeply known and still be a little unknown, still be an object of curiosity for each other.

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