International Day of Happiness. Photo courtesy of Richard Foster/Flickr.
By Earl Abalajon and Shoynear Morrison
Put a smile on your face, Friday is the International Day of Happiness.
International Day of Happiness is a global campaign first celebrated in 2013. This day marks the United Nation’s attempt to recognize how essential happiness is to quality of life.
According to the campaign website, one big cause for unhappiness is loneliness which is twice as detrimental to a person’s health than obesity.
“With urbanization, modern life and technology, people are more isolated in terms of person-to-person contact,” said Humber College counsellor Liz Sokol.
“It’s really critical for all of us to have social support whether that be family or friends,” she said.
Sokol helps students find the root to their problems with being unhappy, including being alone.
“We talk about how they came to be unhappy and depending on what the issue is we’ll move from there,” she said.
She recommends volunteer work as a good way of meeting new people.
“It’s really critical for all of us to have social support whether that be family or friends” – Sokol
When combating unhappiness, the overall perspective of the individual is imperative, Sokol said.
“We can choose to be as happy as possible in any given circumstance.”
The campaign created an innovative way for the public to show their support, creating the hashtag #InternationalDayofHappiness to connect people on social medial.
We took to the halls of Humber’s North campus to find out what makes students happy.