The Science of Sustainable Happiness

What Psychology Reveals About Lasting Wellbeing

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In psychology, we define happiness as a combination of how frequently we experience positive emotions, how infrequently we experience negative ones, and how satisfied we are with life overall. So, happiness isn’t solely a momentary rush of pleasure, but a broader, more stable sense of wellbeing. One that is deeply subjective, with life satisfaction at the heart of it.

What makes this kind of happiness possible?

Many of us assume it’s our circumstances: A better job, a bigger home, a change of scenery. But the research points in a different direction, a far more hopeful one. It suggests that happiness has more to do with how we live than what we face. In other words, how intentionally and actively we participate in our own wellbeing.

So let’s explore what influences our happiness.

The Recipe for Happiness

The Set Point

In one of the most cited models of wellbeing, researchers proposed that happiness is composed by three main factors: a set point, life circumstances, and intentional activities [1]. This breakdown is often referred to as: “The happiness pie.”

Figure: Adapted from Lyubomirsky, S., Sheldon, K. M., & Schkade, D. (2005). Pursuing happiness: The architecture of sustainable change. Review of General Psychology, 9(2), 111–131

The first portion of the pie, known as our set point, refers to our natural baseline for happiness. In other words, our emotional default. You know how some people seem naturally more upbeat, while others have a more reserved or serious temperament? That general tendency reflects what researchers mean by a set point.

This set point accounts for around 50 % of the differences in how happy people tend to be. The set point is largely influenced by genetics, temperament, and personality, and tends to remain relatively stable throughout life. But this does not mean there is such thing as a “happiness gene.” Rather, it reflects the role of inherited traits that shape how we experience the world. For instance, how reactive we are to stress or how sensitive we are to reward.

In terms of personality, traits like extraversion, for example, have been found to correlate with higher levels of happiness. This means that extroverts will report experiencing greater life satisfaction than, say, introverts. Why that is, and what it means is a fascinating subject. But that’s a topic for another post!

Life Circumstances

Life circumstances, such as your income, relationship status, age, or living environment, account for just 10 % of our happiness. That might sound surprisingly low, and it is. But it reflects something most of us overlook: we adapt quickly. This process, known as hedonic adaptation, refers to our tendency to return to a baseline level of happiness after positive or negative changes (we’ll discuss this again later on).

Intentionality

That leaves the final 40 %, where things get interesting. I mean, continue to be interesting.

This portion of the pie comes down to what we do intentionally. Our habits, daily practices, the way we think and the choices we make.

In this way, happiness is not only about what life brings, but about how we experience what life brings. It’s how we live.

The 40% That’s in Our Hands

This final portion of the happiness pie, the 40 %, is where the greatest potential for change lies. Unlike our set point or life circumstances, this part is influenced by the things we do on purpose.

In psychology, we refer to these as intentional activities. They include what we practise, what we focus on, and how we spend our time. In the study, examples of intentional activities that boost life satisfaction ranged from expressing gratitude, through reframing situations in more positive ways, to performing acts of kindness.

Yes, some of these ideas, like gratitude or positive thinking, are widely known. But their effect does not come from simply knowing about them. It comes from practising them. That means actually writing down what you are thankful for, actually taking action even when you do not feel like it, actually pausing to shift your perspective.

These kinds of activities work because they involve effort, attention, and agency. They can be flexible, varied, and always deeply personal. And being intentional goes beyond daily habits. It also means asking questions like, what does time well spent mean to me? What kind of person do I want to be? Then acting on the answers.

Making Happiness Personal

Not all intentional activities work equally well for everyone, though. According to the study, the key to lasting happiness lies not just in simply what we do, but in how well those actions fit who we are.

This is referred to as person–activity fit. Some people may find that writing a gratitude list feels deeply rewarding. Others feel more rewarded when engaging in acts of kindness or spending time in nature. The benefit comes not from following a universal formula, but from choosing practices that feel authentic and enjoyable.

See, when an activity fits, it is more likely to be sustained. And this is essential, because consistency is key to maintaining gains in wellbeing. On the other hand, a poor fit, inevitably leads to a drop in motivation and eventually disengagement.

This is one of the issues I have with certain wellbeing advice. They often overlook individual differences. How can the same advice apply equally to an introvert and an extrovert? When one feels recharged by social activity and the other by solitude?

Still, the study encourages us to experiment. To try different strategies, notice which ones energise us, which ones feel meaningful, and which ones we find ourselves returning to. Of course, this process calls for openness and flexibility, because while there may be no single, universal path to happiness, there certainly is a personal one.

Sustaining Happiness

Intentional activities have the potential to increase happiness, but the gains are not guaranteed to last. According to the study, without continued effort and variety, even positive changes can fade over time.

This is largely due to hedonic adaptation, the phenomenon we briefly mentioned earlier, which refers to the process that weakens the emotional impact of life circumstances. Remember how elated you were when you finally got ‘that thing’ you had been wanting for ages: the new job, the flat in a different neighbourhood. Now it’s just part of your life. That is hedonic adaptation at work. Please don’t think this is a personal flaw. This is simply how we are wired. We get used to things, especially the good ones! What once felt uplifting can gradually become routine, its effect fades like background noise as we gradually habituate to it.

That is why repetition (of intentional activities) alone is not enough. To sustain happiness, the activities we choose need to remain engaging and meaningful. This might mean changing how we practise them, when we return to them, or how we approach them over time. For example, writing a gratitude list three times a week may be more effective than turning it into a daily task. After all, the goal is not rigid consistency, but flexible commitment.

One thing the study tells us is that happiness does not depend on a single breakthrough, but on how we relate to the small things we do repeatedly.

Why Happiness Isn’t Something to Pursue

Before we finish, we should pause to reflect on something more nuanced: the risks of pursuing happiness, or making it a goal.

While this post has explored how happiness can be experienced more sustainably, it does not follow that we should make happiness itself the goal.

There is a growing body of research showing that the more we chase happiness, the more it tends to slip away [4]. The pursuit often creates pressure to feel a certain way, and disappointment when reality does not meet expectation. Some studies even suggest that constantly evaluating how happy we feel can interfere with the experience itself [4].

This idea is not new. Traditions like Buddhism have long pointed to the limits of seeking happiness directly. The paradox is that happiness tends to arise not when we try to capture it, but as a byproduct of how we live. Now, science corroborates this wisdom and helps us define it more clearly.

Earlier, we defined happiness as a combination of how often we experience positive emotions, how infrequently we experience negative ones, and how satisfied we are with life overall. This sense of satisfaction depends on the balance between these emotional experiences, and is built over time through how we respond to our emotions, the habits we sustain, and the choices we make each day.

In my book What Makes a Resilient Mind? I invite readers to think of ‘the happiness pie’ like this: imagine the 60 % as the foundation, the body of the pie. The part that we only have so much control over (our set point & our life circumstances), sometimes if any! But the remaining 40 %, oh... this is the topping. Here, even a few delibarate details can enhance the pie. The topping is what makes the pie colourful, more flavoursome, and uniquely ours, and it depends on how engaged and intentional we are about it.

How it turns out is very much in our hands 🍰

NOTE: This piece draws on research from positive psychology and studies involving non-clinical populations. It is not meant to dismiss the reality of trauma, systemic hardship, or psychiatric conditions.

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Thank you

A Horseman in Shangri-La

, for encouraging me to explore this topic here :)

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Reference List:

[1] Lyubomirsky, S., Sheldon, K. M., & Schkade, D. (2005). Pursuing happiness: The architecture of sustainable change. Review of General Psychology, 9(2), 111–131. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.9.2.111

[2] Lyubomirsky, S., & Layous, K. (2013). How Do Simple Positive Activities Increase Well-Being? Current Directions in Psychological Science, 22(1), 57–62. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721412469809

[3] Lyubomirsky, S., Dickerhoof, R., Boehm, J. K., & Sheldon, K. M. (2011). Becoming Happier Takes Both a Will and a Proper Way: An Experimental Longitudinal Intervention to Boost Well-Being. Emotion, 11(2), 391–402. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0022575

[4] Mauss, I. B., Tamir, M., Anderson, C. L., & Savino, N. S. (2011). Can seeking happiness make people unhappy? Paradoxical effects of valuing happiness. Emotion, 11(4), 807–815. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0022010

[5] Sheldon, K. M., & Lyubomirsky, S. (2006). Achieving Sustainable Gains in Happiness: Change Your Actions, Not Your Circumstances. Journal of Happiness Studies, 7(1), 55–86. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-005-0868-8ResearchGate