As a requirement for my class we had to take the Happy Planet Index, a test that measures your overall happiness based on several different factors. These included Life Expectancy, Ecological Footprint, and Well-Being. I took the test relatively quickly and painlessly.
My results came out as above average, 66.9, the average being 46-53.7, but still well below the "target" of 83. With that score you are living a good life without harming the world. Fairly impossible nowadays anyway, if you ask me.
LIfe Expectancy:
My life expectancy score was 92.7, above the average for my gender of 85.9. Showing that I am eating well, not smoking or drinking, and getting plenty of exercise. Plus having the right jeans on when I took the test couldn't of hurt anything either....... ;) They suggested that I improve my expectancy by giving up my car (kinda hard when you live 7 hrs away...), avoid living alone (I have two roommates?) and shrugging off stress.
Ecological Footprint:
This area for me is something that I hope to change in the future but currently there isn't much I can do to minimize my impact. But here's what they say; My footprint is 3.98 global hectares, or 1.88 planets (how can I use more than one planet?). I'm using between one and a half to two times my share of the planet's resources. I travel a lot for work and vacation, and flying once adds .77 global hectares to your overall impact. Something thats hard going to be hard to stop when I go to school in New York, live in Pennsylvania, and work in New Mexico. They suggest that I take longer vacations (work is 10-12 weeks during the summer....) or travel by train(I'm a broke college student.......and that's expensive). But looking at the average of 4.06, I'd say I'm safe doing what I do now.
Well-Being:
The Well-Being category is separated into three categories; life satisfaction, feeling good?, and doing well?. In the life satisfaction category I scored an 8, higher than the average of 7.11, but lower than Switzerland and Denmark, the highest scoring countries.
In feeling good? I scored a 22, much higher than the average 18.7, but i have hedonic well-being and my levels could change from week to week.
Doing well? has three categories that are necessary for a person to have psychological happiness: Connection to Others, Freedom to be Yourself, and Self-Esteem and making a Difference.
Connecting to others put me lower than average, only 5, not 5.56.
Freedom to be Yourself graded me as a 5.53, higher than the average of 5.03.
And Self-Esteem and making a Difference had me much higher than average with a score of 6.33, the average only being 4.78.
This last category they gave no advice for since it is very person to person dependent.
The entire final "grade" on this seemed very vague, so I'm not quite sure how to interpret this besides the fact that I am normally happier than you average person (my mommy always said I was different.....). So overall this hasn't made me want to change anything in my life or how I do things, I am very satisfied with my life as it is........
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