Happiness is understandable, obtainable, and teachable.

According to the nation's founders, the "pursuit of happiness" is an essential human right, and yet our schools provide us with few intellectual tools to explore the issue seriously. For many, the pursuit of happiness is a political dream, buried with the Declaration of Independence in the national archives.

Nearly twenty percent of U.S. citizens experience some form of depression during their lifetime. Americans are taking so many antidepressants that, according to the New York Times, the water supplies of major American cities are now contaminated with traces of these drugs. The problem is not limited to adults. The American Psychological Association reports that “as many as 9% of children will experience a major depressive episode by the time they are 14 years old, and 20% will experience a major depressive episode before graduating from high school.” Statistics show that children who have suffered from depression are more vulnerable to depression as adults.

That’s the bad news. Now for the good news.

Traditionally psychologists have focused their attentions on what makes depressed people depressed. Yet recently a small group of scientists has turned the question on its head. Now they are asking: “What makes happy people happy?” This Copernican shift in perspective has given rise to the new “science of happiness.”

Resulting from the scientific exploration of happiness, two major areas of consensus are emerging. New studies are confirming what the great philosophical and spiritual thinkers from Confucius to Aristotle taught us long ago. In spite of powerful genetic and environmental influences, a sizeable chunk of our mental well-being depends on our actions and attitudes. Secondly, by cultivating certain strengths and virtues, we are not escaping from the causes of depression. On the contrary, this strategy seems to generate a resilience that protects us from it.

Armed with the new “science of happiness” we can now focus on prevention as well as treatment in the war against depression. This should include a well-rounded education for our children that promotes psychological resilience and strength of character.

How do we accomplish this goal? A number of challenges exist. Exploited by commercial culture and shrouded by mythology, the word “happiness” itself conjures up visions of smiley faces and fleeting pleasures. For those seeking a more enduring peace of mind, a bewildering array of popular remedies compete for attention.

Through analyzing scientific data, we can try to separate wishful thinking from fact. We need to continue finding areas of consensus and showing how this knowledge can be applied in our day-to-day lives. Finally, we need to construct mini-lesson plans and activities for classrooms, so that we can integrate this new found wisdom with existing school curricula. In conjunction with the Greater Good Science Center of UC Berkeley, these are the tasks Pursuit-of-Happiness.org has set for itself.

We are a group of educators and specialists in graphic design, animation and video, constructing a multimedia educational platform on the internet devoted to the topic of human happiness. This multimedia platform provides educators, students, and the general public with free access to clear, concise, information on the history and scientific study of human happiness, positive psychology and mental well-being in general. The website will include a broad variety of audiovisual media as well as text, to bring historical and scientific views on happiness to life.

The website has two main components:

1) The "History of Happiness" presents the views of major thinkers who have focused on the topic, from the worlds of philosophy and psychology. Each module will have introductory, intermediate and advanced content on a particular thinker. You can see a prototype of an introductory module on the Chinese Philosopher Mencius.

2) "The Science of Happiness" which is based on a thorough and broad ranging analysis of recent studies and data on mental well-being, presents key areas of consensus on variables that directly affect our happiness. The areas of consensus that are emerging include social engagement (communicating), civic engagement (caring), spiritual engagement, personal strengths and virtues, positive attitudes and regular physical exercise. We are building a separate educational module (again, with three grades of complexity) on each.

Following numerous inquiries and suggestions from secondary school teaches we are drawing up mini-lesson plans that will show how the multimedia modules can be easily integrated into various components of secondary school curricula.

We hope you enjoy our website. In various ways, the information contained in these pages has touched, and sometimes transformed, the lives of our team at Pursuit-of-Happiness.org. If this website affects your life somehow, or if you have suggestions, we want to hear from you! We invite you write to us or talk about your experiences on “blissblogs” (http://poh-blissblog.blogspot.com/) our website blog.

Go here to find more ways to participate.

Pursuit-of-Happiness.org is not affiliated with any religious or political organization.

If you have questions, comments, or want to learn more about how to present this information in classrooms, please contact us here.