A Guide to Happiness

I want to be happy, but how, when… and then come the complaints, one after another. What I don’t have. What’s missing. What I have to do. And when will that longed-for state finally arrive, when everything is good. The thing is, happiness isn’t a destination, it’s a process. And it’s worth thinking about it that way, because then it suddenly becomes much more reachable.

So how do we define the feeling of happiness?

Happiness is a complex emotional state, usually described through satisfaction, joy, and a sense of inner peace. It’s influenced by both internal and external factors. The internal ones grow out of a mix of genetics and the coping strategies we learned in childhood. These turn into inner beliefs about ourselves and about what feels like safe existence—beliefs that shape how we think about our own lives, our possibilities, our goals, our responsibilities, and our relationships. But there are also external, much more objective factors that, if we pay attention to them, can genuinely make a difference in how happy we feel.

Surprisingly, research shows that financial situation, housing conditions, and overall living standards contribute far less to our sense of happiness than we usually assume. What weighs much more heavily are two key things: the depth, quantity, and quality of our human relationships, and the work we do. When we’re engaged in something we truly enjoy, something we can grow in and achieve results with, it boosts our self-esteem, makes us feel successful and satisfied, and the work itself becomes a source of joy. Teamwork—working together with others toward a shared goal—also creates a shared experience that connects people.

We simply can’t do everything alone. Sometimes we don’t have enough time, sometimes not enough knowledge. Cooperation almost always leads to better outcomes than struggling on your own. Solving tasks together brings people closer; couples, families, workplaces, and communities function best when they support one another. So go for it. Happiness isn’t a fixed state that some people get and others don’t. It’s a way of experiencing life that grows out of positive thoughts, experiences of success, and human connections. Our fate really is in our hands.

There are hard life situations when a person is unhappy. It can be a bad relationship, unemployment, financial difficulties, or a job you don’t like but have to do anyway. In those moments, action is needed—talking to others, looking for allies, and persistently working toward change. And the very first step is being able to imagine what actually brings you joy in life, and what steps are needed to make those things real. As long as our thoughts are stuck on it would be nice if I had a job, it would be nice if I weren’t alone, it would be nice if I didn’t work here, the solution won’t arrive. Because the solution begins when we can see both the goal and the path leading to it. From there on, we’re already moving forward—almost automatically.