When people experience positive emotions they tend to also report feeling enthusiastic, active and alert. High positive emotion is also linked to a states of high energy, full concentration and pleasurable engagement. Research is also clear in demonstrating that positive emotions can help to broaden and build our repertoire of skills and responses to situations.
Positivity serves to broadens one’s spectrum of problem-solving skills, adaptive mechanisms and thought–action repertoires while building inventories and buffers of intellectual, physical, social and, most importantly, psychological resources such as optimism, resilience, and goal orientation (critical for the hope capacity). This in turn can lead to upward spirals of performance, adaptation, and well-being, even when hardships are encountered.
It should be noted that this is not to deny negative emotions, as we need negative emotions to protect us and to help us focus at specific points in time. The key message is that negative emotions serve to drain our resources and positive emotions can help to reinstate and recharge our resources and reserves.