Vaillant

 Vaillant

"Humor- being able to laugh at an unpleasant or disturbing feeling or situation."- page 195  Adult Development and Aging

The psychologist Vaillant described that there are coping strategies that can be used to eliminate negative emotions from our lives. Mature individuals tend to use humor and altruism to remove negative emotions. Psychologists have described that humor is important in removing negative emotions and also boost the immune system and protect the cardiovascular system. Laughter has shown to decrease stress hormones and allow individuals to feel better. Humor can also remove negative ideas and obsessive compulsions.

Altruism allows us to be industrious and turn negative emotions into positive behavior and action to help others. Sublimation allows individuals to turn negative emotions into industrious work including writing and exercising. These strategies prevent us from using negative coping strategies seen in projection and acting out. Positive coping strategies help us turn negative emotions into productive work. At the same time we remove negative emotions, we can be industrious.

"Projection- attributing unacceptable ideas and feelings to others"- page 195

We learn that negative coping strategies include projection that describes an immature individuals need to project their negative emotions or negativity unto others. Projection is used by narcissists and negative individuals in order to cause negative emotions. We learn that we can remove negative emotions instead of using the negative emotions that tend to drain the individual.

Another negative coping strategy is acting out that happens in individuals who can not dominate the emotions. Negative individuals act out of negative emotions complaining, gossiping, and yelling and have not learned positive coping strategies. We learn to persevere utilizing positive coping strategies and removing negative coping strategies. Vaillant described that individuals who are mature are able to utilize humor and altruism to remove negative emotions. We learn that the socialists have attempted to prevent humor from being appreciated because humor actually helps develop resiliency and positivity. Humor removes the negative emotions.

There Are Psychological Studies That Prove That Gratitude and Empathy Protect Against Cardiovascular Disease and Depression

"Much of the interest in the topic of health and personality has centered on the type A behavior pattern, a collection of traits thought to increase a person's risk of developing cardiovascular disease."- (page 200)

"Men who had high levels of personality risk [type A] also showed greater increases over the course of the study of both C3 and C4."- page 200

There are studies done by psychologists that have shown that being hostile towards others and practicing negative emotions causes cardiovascular disease. Personalities that are type A meaning they are hostile and tend to be angry tend to develop cardiovascular disease because C3 and C4 protein levels increase with anger and hostility (Friedman and Rosenman, 1974) (Boyle et al, 2007). Studies have shown that people that are hostile towards others tend to develop depression. There are also studies that prove that having gratitude each day allows individuals to be healthier and protects the cardiovascular system.

Gratitude allows us to develop resiliency and helps us keep positive. Positivity has shown to help individuals live longer and protects against heart disease and depression. Practicing empathy helps us acknowledge that we can be positive and help others. This prevents us from being hostile and negative. Hostility without cause towards others has shown to cause negative emotions and also has a negative impact on health (Siegler et al, 2003). We can persevere having gratitude each day and practicing empathy while removing ingratitude and negative emotions from our day to day lives. 

The Importance of Self-Discipline

“It is possible that high levels of self-discipline relate to a greater tendency to be proactive in engaging in behaviors that are protective of health and to avoid those behaviors that are damaging to health" (Weiss and Costa, 2005).- page 201 of Adult Development and Aging by Susan Krauss Whitbourne

There are studies in Psychology that describe that self-discipline is important in persevering with good health. Similar to the studies of the importance of practicing gratitude and empathy, having self-discipline has shown to help individuals live healthier lives. In another study, having high levels of conscientiousness and self-discipline was related to having lower mortality risk over a three year period in a study with 1,000 individuals aged 65 to 100 years of age. The individuals were followed over a three to five year period and individuals who had self-discipline had a lower mortality risk.

This can be explained by the fact that self-discipline allows us to have structure and be dedicated to keep healthy behaviors while removing negative behaviors that do not help our health. Self-discipline helps us know that we need to exercise almost everyday and also make sure that we avoid risky health behaviors including smoking, drinking, and being hostile and angry. Psychologists in the 2000s described the importance of practicing gratitude, genuine empathy, and having self-discipline. Along with having a sense of humor, we can persevere practicing integrity and having a pleasant demeanor.

Developing Resiliency Worshiping GOD Almighty

There are studies in Psychology that state that there are specific actions that we can take to develop resiliency. It is known that practicing gratitude and being positive prevents individuals from having negative emotions. We learn that being self-didactic and exercising also helps develop resiliency. There are studies that state that individuals that have faith in GOD Almighty and are religious tend to live longer (after the covid “pandemic” we learned that churches were closed, yet this did not prevent us from keeping a zealous faith in GOD Almighty and having healthy skepticism concerning the socialists. (The socialists also tried to close gyms since exercise keeps us young.) We learned that the socialists do not like that individuals have faith because we are able to persevere with gratitude and happiness.)

"Religious participation as a predictor of mortality above the effects of physical functioning." (Lutgendorf et al, 2004) (page 62-63) The results of a multivariate correlational design study described that being religious decreased IL-6 levels (a harmful immune system factor that leads to inflammation and deleterious reactions). Individuals who attended church had lower mortality and a better immune system.

It was noted in a study in the 2000s that individuals who attended church were more likely to live longer and be resilient. This has also been noted in individuals that profess having faith in GOD Almighty. Psychologists have described since the 2000s that keeping faith helps individual's health and longevity. This describes that the Scriptures speak truth concerning the manner that worshiping GOD Almighty above everything helps us persevere and have good health. When we obey the commandments of Moses, we persevere without infirmities. There were studies with centennarians that described that individuals that were positive, grateful, religious, and humble tended to live longer. Some of them were still independent despite living more than a 100 years. This describes that we can take positive steps to keep practicing gratitude and persevere in the faith and worship of GOD Almighty.

Vaillant Disproved the Lie of the Midlife Crisis Myth

"The concept of the midlife crisis was first aired in the media when journalist Gail Sheehy in 1974 published a best selling paperback book called Passages: Man's Predictable Crises of Adult Life. This book, which was based on a study being conducted at the time by psychologist Daniel Levinson, described the supposed changes that occured at each decade marker of adulthood. The years of the early 40s, according to this view, were marked by inner turmoil and outer acts of rebellion against the placid, middle-aged lifestyle into which the individual was fated to slip by the 50s. Shortly after the publication of Passages, Levinson published his own best-seller called The Season's of a Man's Life, which was a collaborative effort of a team of Yale psychologists, psychiatrists, and sociologists (Levinson et al, 1978). This book focused exclusively on the experience of men in midlife through the analysis of interviews of 40 men ranging in age from the mid-30s to the mid-40s. The men in the sample tended to represent men from diverse backgrounds, with 10 from each of the following occupations: business executive, academic biologist, blue-collar worker, and novelist. In addition to these interviews the authors included informal analyses of the biographies of famous men and the stories of men portrayed in literature."- (page 210)

In the 2000s there was the myth of the midlife crisis seen in movies, series, books, and socialist propaganda that states that supposedly increasing in age causes depression and negative emotions in individuals. The midlife crisis lie was written by sociologists and socialists who were affluent individuals who stated that as an individual increased in age, they would go through a midlife crisis. This was a blatant lie and was written by socialists who did not have belief and did not worship GOD Almighty. They described that there is meaninglessness and a lack of purpose as individuals reach their fifth decade of life. Supposedly, there are negative emotions that occur due to a nihilistic perspective. The individual who wrote the midlife crisis theory was actually discouraged and attempted to make a theory based on his circumstances. The theory states that individuals have negative emotions due to realizing that they are halfway through their life. However, this is incongruent because no one knows how long they are going to live and if there is gratitude and meaning, there is no need to be negative and discouraging.

There were psychologists, psychiatrists, and sociologists who also attempted to validate the supposed theory by making surveys with forty or so individuals that were mostly affluent and a few individuals of the working class. Vaillant described that the so called midlife crisis is a lie because individuals keep having meaning and purpose throughout their lives. Vaillant initially agreed and then changed his mind and repudiated the theory describing that development creates transitions and transitions do not create development. This means that individuals that have meaning and purpose keep developing and improving themselves even when there are transitions in life such as difficult circumstances. The transitions are not the reason for development and instead it is the meaning and purpose that keeps us glad and resilient. There are multiple psychologists who have disproved the midlife crisis theory and have described that individuals have meaning and purpose throughout their lives regardless of circumstances. Viktor E. Frankl lived until 93 years of age and kept being industrious throughout his life being able to instruct reproof and logotherapy into his old age. Despite the envy of socialists, Viktor E. Frankl persevered being industrious throughout his life. The midlife crisis myth may have been written with the intention to discourage individuals into believing that they need to be nihilistic and negative about aging. Instead we learn that age is not a burden and in fact ethical individuals can get better with age seen in Viktor E. Frankl.

Psychologists That Disproved the Midlife Crisis Myth

There are multiple psychologists that disproved the midlife crisis myth. The psychologists described that the design of the study was flawed because while three fourths of the participants were affluent, educated, and priviledged, the study tried to generalize and extrapolate the findings to the general population. We learn that the study findings were not reproducible nor replicated by other psychologists describing that the study design was highly flawed (Whitborne). The interview questionnaires and data was also not available for comparion describing flaws in the design study. The lack of data and questionnaire answers from the original study indicated that there may have been lies told. When the study was replicated by other psychologists, they discovered that individuals do not actually have a midlife crisis and are stable. 

Mcrae and Costa described that individuals in their late thirties and early fortys do not have a midlife crisis. It was individuals who have high levels of neuroticism who were more prone to have a midlife crisis. The age of an individual was not indicative of a midlife crisis and instead it was the trait of neuroticism. Chronic psychological disorders were described being correlated with a midlife crisis instead.

Additional Lies of the Midlife Crisis Myth

The midlife crisis myth is another lie made up by socialists to discourage and lead to ingratitude. The midlife crisis myth is another of the many lies that socialists have come up with to lead to doubting and discouragements. There are individuals in their adult years who did not get discouraged by aging and instead persevered with faith in GOD Almighty without becoming  atheistic, nihilistic, and much less socialists. The midlife crisis myth also tells individuals to "resolve the polarity of their personality involving their masculinity and femininity" in their older years implying that individuals can be homosexuals. Individuals are either masculine males or feminine females and there is no polarity of personality to resolve. The midlife crisis myth may also have attempted to lead individuals to homosexuality and the practice of sin.

"Levinson regarded the midlife crisis to be a virtually universal process that has characterized human existance for at least 10,000 years."- (page 212)

We have only been on earth for about 5,990 years. (Atheist pseudo-science has stated that humanity has been on earth for 500 billions of years also). There are individuals that have persevered with faith in GOD Almighty (who did not care about fame) who did not get discouraged despite their increasing age and kept being industrious including Viktor E. Frankl, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Anatoly Fastenko, Dusya Chmill, the older Christian believers in the Soviet Union who never renounced their faith, Ronald Reagan, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Ludwig van Beethoven, the late Pastor John Wilkerson and Pastor Zacchariah, Priest Eziquio Trevizo, Michael Debakey, Pope John Paul II, Mother Theresa of Calcutta, priests, nuns, pastors, Christian believers, and grandparents.