No quest in life is greater than finding out what truly makes you happy. It’d be a shame to waste an entire lifetime barking up the wrong tree only to realize in your final years what truly matters. But sadly, not everyone finds true happiness. A 2025 Gallup poll found that only 44% of Americans are “very satisfied” with their lives, down 21 points from 2020 and the lowest score since the poll began in 2001.

To help people better understand what makes humans happy, 13 of the world’s leading well-being researchers got together earlier this year on a Zoom call. Their goal: to share what their 600 total years of happiness research and lived experience taught them about finding the good life. They documented their reflections in a research paper published in the Journal of Happiness Studies.

The overwhelming takeaway is that relationships are the biggest key to happiness. “Happiness emerges from a symphony of factors, but if I had to pinpoint one secret to happiness,........

© Upworthy