Ten Keys to Happier Living, in Two-Minute Stories

As coordinator of the Erasmus+ project Happiness in Practice, SOLIS SRLS has helped turn a well-known wellbeing framework into something people can actually use in everyday life.

The starting point is the 10 Keys to Happier Living developed by Action for Happiness. Read in order, their initials spell GREAT DREAM — Giving, Relating, Exercising, Awareness, Trying out; Direction, Resilience, Emotions, Acceptance, Meaning. The first five are about what we do; the second five, about how we make sense of things. Together they trace a journey rather than a checklist.

To bring the keys to life, the project produced a collection of ten short animated videos. Each lasts about two minutes and follows Luna, the same character throughout, in small everyday moments — reading a message, holding a bowl she has just made, kneeling in a garden after a storm. The videos don't explain or instruct; they open a question: what does this make me think about in my own life?

That openness is the point. In a workshop, a two-minute video becomes the start of something larger: watch together, share what stayed with you, ask a question that opens a story, and try one small practice before the next meeting — the same active-listening approach that shaped the project's empathy circles in Italy, Spain and Belgium.

Produced in Italian, Spanish and French, the videos are open-access and free to use — one of several resources, alongside the Happiness Toolkit and the European Community of Practice, that remain available for educators and organisations to adapt to their own contexts.

Watch the collection and explore the full set of resources at happinesspractice.com.

Happiness in Practice: Positive Psychology & Community Resilience — Project no. 2025-1-IT02-KA210-ADU-000350376. Co-funded by the European Union.