“I have been teaching psychology at the University of Pennsylvania for more than thirty years . . . . . one year I was stumped for an assignment to do ‘something fun with doing something altruistic.’ Marisa Lascher, one of the least conventional of the students, suggested that we have a ‘Gratitude Night’ . . . Class members would bring a guest who had been important in their lives, but whom they had never properly thanked. . . Each would present a testimonial about that person by way of thanks, and a discussion would follow each testimonial. The guests would not know about the exact purpose of the gathering until the gathering itself . . . There was literally not a dry eye in the room . . . Crying in any class is extraordinary, and when everyone is crying, something has happened that touches the great rhizome underneath all humanity. Gratitude Night is now the high point of the class. As a teacher and as a human being, it is hard to ignore all this.”

-Marty Seligman in Authentic Happiness

“Many of the exercises that work actually begin in my courses . . . hence, the gratitude visit, which was dreamed up by Marisa Lascher. In five courses on positive psychology, I assigned students to carry out in their own lives the exercises we had thought up. What ensued was remarkable. I have never seen so much positive life change in students or heard the sweetest words a teacher can hear – life changing – used so often to describe the course.”

-Marty Seligman in Flourish