The Happiness Institute asks the right questions about happiness

The Happiness Institute was founded by Professor Timothy Sharp in 2003 and promotes positive psychology within Australia by using principles from basic workshops, seminars and executive coaching.

The Happiness Institute coaching services group offers coaching and psychology professionals the opportunity to purchase their intellectual property as part of a licence, which will enable the practitioner to enhance their current client offering in their coaching or psychology practice.

Professor Sharp believes that happiness is building and focusing on a great life and not worrying too much about momentary fluctuations in mood. He thinks that in many cases, the wrong question is being asked when it comes to happiness, in that too many people ask, either themselves or others, the question: "are you happy?"

This might seem like a reasonable question, but the reason Professor Sharp believes it is not the best is because when answering it is too easy to focus on momentary moods or feelings, which can change rapidly for better or worse and at times not fully reflect the true state of someone’s life.

Professor Sharp and the Happniness Institute believe the better question to ask, from a positive psychology point of view is something akin to, "taking everything into account, how satisfied am I with my life overall?"

The reason Professor Sharp believes this is a better question is because it overrides the daily or momentary fluctuations in mood and encourages the questioner and responder to focus more on whether they are really living a good life, rather than whether they happen to be experiencing one of the many positive emotions in that instance.

Professor Sharp hopes this will allow people to separate temporary frustrations and short term stressors from the reality of their life and think "taking everything into account, I have a wonderful and happy existence”. This doesn't mean life has to be perfect, but that people can remain strong even when they are being buffeted by irritations and difficulties.

So, real happiness is about asking the right question and it should take into account pleasure and positive emotions as well as meaning, purpose, connectedness and engagement.