Frank Martela
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frankmartela.bsky.social
Frank Martela
@frankmartela.bsky.social
How to live a good life? Assistant professor @ Aalto University exploring meaning in life, well-being, motivation, and what makes life good. And how organizations and societies can support human flourishing. Psychology, philosophy, organizational research.
Miten löytää iloa ja turvaa epävarmoina ja pelottavina aikoina? Tästä aiheesta kävin sunnuntaina keskustelemassa Ilkka Lahden kanssa TV1:n Sunnuntai-ohjelmassa. Oma osuuteni alkaa 32.00 kohdasta. Vastasin muun muassa kysymykseen "Mikä on sinun oma missiosi?"
areena.yle.fi/1-72847864
October 1, 2025 at 1:42 PM
Also, I can now refer to my book as "featured on CBS"! 😀
September 28, 2025 at 12:29 PM
Praise to comedians! They do a vital job of ridiculing those in power, exposing any double standards and empty promises. Democracy dies without laughter. That’s why would-be authoritarian leaders are so eager to silence the comedians - their power pose can’t withstand it being poked with ridicule.
September 20, 2025 at 12:35 PM
Israel has stopped pretending that they are targeting Hamas, while killing civilians:
”Almost all the casualties in Gaza in recent days have been linked to the delivery of aid rather than Israeli strikes on Hamas targets.”

www.bbc.com/news/article...
June 17, 2025 at 4:56 PM
Israel celebrates participation in Eurovision by intensifying the killing of Palestinians. Feeling powerless by inaction of Europe, I donated to Doctors without Borders to at least do something to help those targeted by ethnic cleansing!
May 17, 2025 at 7:18 PM
Professor Richard Ryan, the world's leading expert on motivation and well-being, is coming to Finland and we are excited to organize a seminar at Aalto about how to lead engagement for well-being and performance!

So join us on June 3rd at 16-18!
Free of charge, register here:
lnkd.in/diZMNTHb
May 12, 2025 at 2:46 PM
In this year’s Champions League, the best goalies take their teams to the final. 😐⚽️
#championsleague #ucl
May 7, 2025 at 9:18 PM
What is human well-being? Many key theories of well-being argue that besides positive experiences, well-being is about positive psychological functioning. But what then is positive psychological functioning? This is what my just published article aims to examine:
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
May 5, 2025 at 4:01 PM
What is this thing with declining empires wanting to self-sabotage just to avoid collaborating with others?
April 4, 2025 at 4:14 PM
My book Stop Chasing Happiness was launched yesterday, with a little help from CNN promoting it when interviewing me about why the Nordic countries are so happy! 😊
The book is about finding an attitude in life where you are less bothered by adversities & more energized to pursue self-selected goals.
March 21, 2025 at 12:58 PM
Next week - on the International Day of Happiness 20th of March - my new book will be published in English! The title is:
Stop Chasing Happiness - A Pessimist’s guide to a good life 🙃

More about the book in this thread:
March 12, 2025 at 2:31 PM
If you have been wondering why Trump/Vance are behaving like Putin, Erdoğan, & other authoritarian leaders, it’s because the foreign policy values of US right are closer to Russia and Turkey than any democratic country.
Reported by the (woke legacy media) Financial Times:
www.ft.com/content/3046...
March 7, 2025 at 10:41 PM
Democracy dies in darkness. And darkness has now fully taken over Washington Post, as the billionaire owner directly intervenes with what opinions are allowed to be published on its pages (having already directly intervened on who the paper should endorse in the presidential election).
February 27, 2025 at 9:51 AM
The spread of false information that social media has amplified not only undermines democracies. It kills children - in this case an unvaccinated child died of a disease that vaccines had already eradicated decades ago. 😟

amp.cnn.com/cnn/2025/02/...
February 26, 2025 at 8:53 PM
Turns out participating in an autocratic takeover of government, with no competence or understanding of how government functions, is not the best market stunt to sell cars.
February 25, 2025 at 6:48 AM
Seuraava kirjani ilmestyy aika tasan kuukauden päästä:
Älä etsi onnea - epätyypillisiä elämänohjeita nykyihmiselle. 🤔

Kirjan viestinä on, että usein parempi elämä käynnistyy väärien ajattelutapojen poisoppimisesta. Siksi kirjan yhdeksästä luvusta kuusi ensimmäistä alkaa 'Lakkaa välittämästä...'
February 11, 2025 at 1:35 PM
The second Trump term is starting to look as a much more coordinated attack against the checks and balances keeping the government democratic.
www.wired.com/story/elon-m...
February 2, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Our Open Strategy research project offers a free seminar on some insights we've gained about how to build strategy in participatory ways. Keynotes by me, prof. Violetta Splitter from Oxford, & Tuomas Syrjänen from Futurice.
More info in the flyer, register here:
openstrategy.fi/sign-up-for-...
January 23, 2025 at 8:26 PM
I can so relate: 😀
”Too many times I have rediscovered ’my most original ideas’ in pages of books that I have read five or ten years ago, underlined, with my enthusiastic, but forgotten, comments in the margin.”
We stand on shoulders of giants - although we often forget which shoulders!
December 30, 2024 at 11:20 PM
Why did Trump win? There’s not been enough talk of the four long-term trends that have made US democracy so vulnerable that a clearly anti-democratic candidate could succeed:
1) Dramatically increased distrust in political system
2) Changed media landscape

frankmartela.substack.com/p/trumps-win...
December 11, 2024 at 12:18 PM
Hallitus sanoi puhuvansa teoin rasismia vastaan.
Eilen tekona oli kansanedustajan julkinen marssiminen avoimen äärioikeistolaisten toimijoiden kanssa.
Pääministeri Orpon teko oli voimaton paheksunta.
Tekemättömyydellään Orpo osallistui äärioikeiston normalisointiin ja voimaannuttamiseen Suomessa.
December 7, 2024 at 10:38 AM
”While situation might seem hopeless and the decline inevitable, history has shown that committed citizens can alter the course of the history. But not automatically. Only if enough of us commit to collective action for a better, more democratic world.”
frankmartela.substack.com/p/without-ac...
November 24, 2024 at 3:04 PM
World Happiness Report was published today and Finland tops the ranking again. If you want to understand why this is the case, I write about a surprising moment from our recent Presidential elections, that reveals the secret to Finnish happiness:
frankmartela.substack.com/p/want-to-ma...
March 20, 2024 at 4:01 PM
Winning Olympics requires strict diet, no pastries, daily excercise, and so forth. Funny to read a 1900 year old text from ancient Greece - and yet have the same cultural reference! 😄🤼‍♀️
…Reading Epictetus’ Encheiridion, translated by A.A. Long
December 26, 2023 at 11:35 PM