World’s first Happiness Museum opens in Copenhagen, Denmark
Denmark is one of the best places in the world when it comes to wellbeing, happiness and quality of life, according to the UN World Happiness Reports.
Denmark, currently the second happiest country on earth (Finland is the first one!), is now home to The Happiness Museum, an institution dedicated to the idea of happiness and how it has been perceived and discussed over the centuries.
The Happiness Museum, which is curated by The Happiness Research Institute, explores the geography, politics, history and future of happiness, the anatomy of smiles, and Nordic happiness.
The Happiness Museum officially opened on July 14 in a small 240-squaremeter (2,585 square foot) space in Copenhagen.
The Museum of Happiness has the capacity for 25 visitors at a time during the coronavirus pandemic. It also features interactive activities, mental experiments and artifacts of happiness.
Visitors will take part in exercises involving light and chocolate, as well as take part in thought experiments. One experiment involves the choice of taking a red pill or a blue pill, one will give you the illusion of a perfect life and the other gives you the chance to live in the real world. Which one would you choose?
“We believe that being here together, enjoying the moment, is a form of happiness because we are creating our memories for the future,” said visitor Maria Have.
“We Danes often hear that we are among the happiest people in the world. Here, we want to enter, give nuances and convey what it really is,” said Wiking, CEO of The Happiness Research Institute,.
“We might be Danish or Mexican or American or Chinese, but we are first and foremost people,” Wiking said to CNN. “It’s the same things that drive happiness no matter where we’re from, and I hope that people will see that in the exhibition.” “I hope visitors will see how alike we are when it comes to happiness – that our guests exit the museum wiser, happier and a little more motivated to make the world a better place.”
What is the future of happiness? Will our phones know how we feel? 🙂
As the Happiness Museum tries to share with its guests, happiness is a feeling that evolves and takes some nurturing both from society and from within. Work at it enough, and you’ll be better equipped to find the silver linings in these stormy days.
