On March 20, the world celebrates the International Day of Happiness. This is another good reason to talk about whether Ukrainians are able to feel the fullness of life during a major war, to talk about fatigue, resilience, and what people today put into the very concept of "happiness."
UNN, together with a practical psychologist, delved into all these issues.
Are Ukrainians happy: what the world ranking shows
On the eve of the International Day of Happiness, the Oxford University Wellbeing Research Centre, in partnership with Gallup and the United Nations, published the annual World Happiness Report 2026.
In it, Ukraine ranked 111th with a score of 4.658. For comparison, Finland took first place with a score of 7.764.
It is important that this ranking is not based on situational emotions, but on people's self-assessment of their own lives, averaged over 2023-2025. The report also notes that social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom of life choices, generosity, and perceptions of corruption significantly influence differences between countries.
Happiness in Ukraine in numbers
Despite the war and the constant stresses associated with it, 69% of Ukrainians feel happy. This is evidenced by data from a sociological survey conducted by specialists from the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS). 37% of respondents described themselves as absolutely happy. Another 32% of Ukrainians interviewed by sociologists believe that they are more happy than unhappy. And 12% hesitated with their answer.
This indicates a high level of resilience and psychological adaptation of Ukrainian society, which even in extremely difficult conditions of war maintains a sense of meaning in life, hope, and inner optimism.
Why Ukrainians are happy despite the war: experts' opinions
Psychologists explain that several factors help people feel happy in a country where active hostilities are ongoing.
First of all, it's about strong social connections. Support from family, loved ones, and friends is the main resource. In the face of an external threat, the value of human relationships has significantly increased.
In addition, the psyche adapts to prolonged stress. War has become a constant background of life, allowing people to focus on everyday affairs, work, and small joys.
The feeling of civic duty fills life with meaning and helps overcome helplessness. Since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, people have become more actively involved in volunteering and helping those who find themselves in difficult life situations. They support people who have lost their homes during shelling, internally displaced persons, the wounded, orphans, and widows.
Ukrainians' psyche is also helped by faith in a happy future. Even now, more than 60% of people believe that in 10 years Ukraine will be a prosperous state within the EU. Such optimism helps people to be more mentally resilient.
In addition, even a change in consumer culture has affected the feeling of happiness. Recently, as psychologists note, gifts and purchases have become more symbolic. People put more emotional meaning into them, which becomes another way to combat stress.
Safety, family, children: what happiness means to people in Ukraine
According to sociological studies (in particular, KIIS and the Razumkov Center), Ukrainians' understanding of happiness during the war has shifted from material gains to moral values.
Now our compatriots see happiness in:
- the safety and health of loved ones. The ability to know that relatives are alive, safe, or simply in touch has become the main source of peace and joy;
- family and children. Communication with family is perceived as the most powerful resource. Seeing children's successes or simply being next to loved ones is what gives meaning to move forward;
- peace and victory. For Ukrainians, happiness is now inextricably linked to the global context. The feeling of approaching victory or peaceful nights without alarms are perceived as personal happiness;
- volunteering;
- everyday household moments. Ukrainians have learned to "appreciate the moment": a delicious coffee in the morning, a walk in the park, a sunny day, or the opportunity to work. Previously, these things were considered ordinary, now they are reasons for joy.
How not to steal the joy of today from yourself: a psychotherapist gave Ukrainians small tips
During the war, feeling happy becomes very difficult for many Ukrainians, but the very fact of constant stress does not cancel a person's ability to experience joy, peace, and gratitude for the day lived. This was stated in a conversation with UNN by psychotherapist, member of the Ukrainian Union of Psychotherapists Natalia Ulko.
According to her, even in a state of exhaustion, a person does not completely lose access to positive emotions if they remain attentive to what is happening to them here and now.
As the specialist explained, it is important to distinguish between a person's general state and their individual emotions. According to her, anxiety, sadness, or exhaustion can coexist with moments of joy.
We can also have feelings of happiness. And this is against the background of some general stress and so on. Because emotions have a cause
She added that even in difficult periods, a person can smile, rejoice at something, and notice positive things, and therefore much depends on what their attention is focused on.
It's about what we pay attention to. It's about what our focus of attention is on
Natalia Ulko separately drew attention to the fact that stress resistance should not be reduced only to the ability to endure loads. According to her, it is also the ability to recover and take care of oneself in the long run.
Stress resistance is not just about enduring
The specialist noted that it is not about heroism in the everyday sense, but about the ability to stop in time, rest, watch a good movie, draw, dance, or do anything that returns a person's inner resource.
According to the psychotherapist, the feeling of happiness is often associated not with great achievements, but with the ability to see small daily events that are usually perceived as something ordinary. Ulko gave an example that people usually name work, shopping, or everyday life in the list of their affairs, but do not notice the very fact of a new day.
The fact that we woke up, we ate, we drank tea, we looked at the sun. Because that's what brings us joy
According to the UNN interlocutor, it is precisely such simple things that can calm a person, give them the opportunity to smile, and restore a sense of support in a reality that remains difficult due to the war.
The psychotherapist also emphasized that it is important for a person to understand what exactly they are capable of influencing. This, according to her, gives a sense of inner stability and does not allow one to completely immerse oneself in anxiety about the future.
It is important for a person to understand that there is something they can influence
She connects this with accepting the imperfection of life and refusing to constantly focus on shortcomings, losses, or unmet expectations. In her opinion, a person steals the joy of the present from themselves when they constantly live with the worry of what might happen tomorrow, although these events have not yet occurred or may not happen at all.
Another important aspect that Natalia Ulko emphasized concerns a person's inner position. According to her, if a person chooses the role of a victim and expects others to constantly fill them, they gradually give control over their own state to external circumstances. In the context of war, this is especially dangerous.
Surely the enemy would very much like us to be dependent on what he does or does not do, for us to become victims, for us to give up, for us not to rejoice in the day that has come. But then, it turns out, we lost. Internally
According to the psychotherapist, in Ukrainian realities, happiness should not be understood as a constant state of carelessness. It is rather about resilience, about the ability to see meaning in one's own actions, to support oneself, and not to lose contact with what is available to a person now.
But what matters is what we pay attention to, what our focus is on
According to her, it is precisely this approach that helps not to cancel life even in times of great tension and to feel happy.