Patricia Hundsdorfer

It all started a few years ago when I decided to live abroad for a year after finishing my master's degree. Up to this point, everything had gone pretty much according to plan, a typical Western European path in life: good high school grades with direct transition into university, practical year, master's thesis at a large company, completed degree with distinction... and now?

I had no idea what to do now…! So many hours spent on books, in front of the laptop, during internships, in the clinic or in the office. I knew how to set up a good scientific study, how our brain processes stimuli and what diagnostic features depression has - but what I didn't know was who I really am and what I expect from my life.

So I packed my bags and set off for Canada without a real plan and without a real goal. And so began my adventure in the second largest country in the world. What followed was a year full of ups and downs, full of new experiences and endless opportunities to develop myself, to prove myself and to leave my beloved comfort zone. And although there were many hurdles and challenges and I often felt completely overwhelmed, at the same time I had For the first time in my life I had the feeling of having arrived, of being more myself than I had been up to this point in my life!

I really felt like I was blossoming - I was in better touch with my own feelings, I was able to use my own strengths better, I found it easier to perceive the actual moment and concentrate on the present. I was more resilient to emerging difficulties and at the same time creative and open to new things! I was in an upward spiral! A phenomenon which, as I later learned, is defined in positive psychology as “flourishing”. (Learn more about positive psychology and flourishing here).

At this point, you might think that my development was probably due to the fact that I was abroad, far away from domestic obligations – doesn’t that make everyone feel better somehow?

But on closer inspection, it quickly becomes clear that this cannot have been the decisive factor. I worked constantly (sometimes in jobs that were anything but fun), I had to keep my money together, there was constant uncertainty! The change was rooted in myself – I managed to be more open and in more contact with people, listened more to my inner compass, spent an incredible amount of time in nature, allowed myself to feel many emotions and learned humility towards our planet!

Back home in Germany, I knew that I had to continue to focus on my personal development – I wanted to know what exactly I had experienced there in Canada, what had happened to my well-being!

And so I came across the Positive Psychology: a new branch of research in psychology, of which I had never heard a word in 5 years of study (Learn more about positive psychology here).

Psychological training today is very deficit and problem-oriented; it's about getting people from -10 to 0 on their individual well-being scale. And that's very important and good work!

But what about the other end of the scale? Shouldn't everyone have the chance to develop their full potential and become the best version of themselves?

Martin Seligmann is one of the founders and greatest advocates of positive psychology and he claims that the goal of psychology must be not only to lift people from the basement to neutral in terms of their well-being, i.e. from -10 to 0, but also to illuminate the other end of the scale and bring people from 0 or 1 to 7, 8, 9 or even 10!

I believe that for the first time in my time in Canada, I personally reached the extreme right end of my own well-being scale and it was wonderful!

That's why I decided to become self-employed and start hummingbirdmoments because I want to help people reach the right side of the scale! And don’t we all owe it to ourselves to create the best life we can?

If you've reached the end of this page, you've read my personal journey to flourishing - thank you for taking the time to read it!

All love,

Your Patricia