However unknown they are for most people, character strengths are the building blocks of positive psychology theories. They represent our positive traits, what we as individuals excel at and enjoy engaging in. We don’t necessarily need to be born with them, we could have learned or developed them throughout our lives and everyone has all 24 character strengths in different degrees.

There are six universal virtues (wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, transcendence) and each one includes four character strengths:

• Cognitive strengths (wisdom): creativity, curiosity, judgement, love of learning, perspective.
• Emotional strengths (courage): bravery, honesty, perseverance, zest.
• Social and community strengths (humanity and justice): kindness, love, social intelligence, fairness, leadership, teamwork
• Protective strengths (temperance): forgiveness, self-regulation, humility, prudence.
• Spiritual strengths (transcendence): appreciation of beauty and excellence, gratitude, hope, humour, spirituality.

You can discover the character strengths which form part of your character profile thanks to this free survey. Knowing what your predominant strengths are and using them to their full potential will help you in different aspects of your life and to improve your general well-being.