Three good things (positive emotions pillar)

Write down three good things that happened today and why they happened.

Why it works

Negativity bias causes the brain to register negative events more vividly than positive ones. The three-good-things exercise counteracts this by requiring deliberate attention to positive events and their causes. The causal attribution step ("why did this happen?") is critical: attributing positive events to internal, stable, global causes builds learned optimism, which has downstream effects on motivation and resilience.

How to do it

1. Each evening, write down three specific good things that happened today — large or small.
2. For each, write one sentence about why it happened (your role in it, a person who contributed, a circumstance that enabled it).
3. Be specific: "Had a good conversation with Sam about the project" is more useful than "had a good day."
4. Continue for at least two weeks; effects build with consistency.

Evidence

Seligman et al. (2005) found three-good-things to be among the most effective positive psychology exercises in a randomized trial, with happiness increases and depression decreases persisting at six months. (rct)

Effect sizes are modest; the study used a self-selected internet sample. Replication with more rigorous methods shows smaller effects, though still positive.

Sources

• Seligman, Steen, Park & Peterson (2005), "Positive psychology progress: empirical validation of interventions," American Psychologist

Common mistake

Doing it perfunctorily ("had coffee, it was fine") — the mechanism requires genuine attention and the causal attribution step. Without the "why," it reduces to a gratitude list without the attribution benefit.