On the pursuit of happiness? According to Nataly Kogan[1] , co-founder and CEO of Happier, Inc.[2] , your search could end with a smiley-faced pancake.


In her TEDTalk[3] , "How Pancakes Can Make You Happier And Change The World," Kogan explains that the key to happiness lies in collecting the small, bright moments we experience on a daily basis. It's the little things, she says, that will ultimately lead to feelings of joy.


Kogan and her family fled religious persecution in the former Soviet Union when she was just 13 years old. When Kogan arrived in the States, her prime motivation was chasing the elusive "American dream." As she recalls, as a new American trying to assimilate, she believed happiness was achieved through the accumulation of wealth and career success.


"To me, the American dream was to become happy. Really, really, really happy," Kogan said. "And the way that I thought you got there was by doing a lot, achieving a lot and making a lot of money."


After about two decades of this chase, Kogan found herself exhausted and unsatisfied. Her so-called "holy-crap moment" was realizing that chasing the "big happy," was futile. Happiness, she discovered, could be felt by collecting "small, tiny, positive moments," like the one she experienced when she whipped up a smiley-faced pancake for her daughter's breakfast on a whim.


The epiphany led Kogan to develop a website and app -- Happier[4] -- that helps users collect their happy moments. As she tells it, Happier endeavors to encourage people to stop saying "I'll be happy when..." and to start saying "I'm happier now because ..." Learn more about this route to happiness and Kogan's new mission in her TEDTalk above.



For more on happiness, click here[5] .



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  • <a href="http://huffingtonpost.com/news/happiness" target="_hplink">Happiness</a>, as the Merriam-Webster dictionary defines it, is <a href="http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/happiness" target="_hplink">"a state of well-being and contentment."</a> Sure, that's one way to put it. But what does it <em>really</em> mean to feel on top of the world or entirely at peace with oneself? Do you feel immersed in joy? On cloud nine? We were curious about the deeper, more personal interpretations of the sensation we all know so well. So <a href="https://www.facebook.com/HuffPostLiving/posts/10151475919558795" target="_hplink">we asked our Facebook community</a> to tell us how they explain the joyful feeling. See some of our favorite definitions below then let us know in the comments: How do <em>you</em> define happiness?




  • <strong>"Being at peace with everything going on around you."</strong> -- Kimberly Clark




  • <strong>"Travel!"</strong> -- Verna Coomer Ott




  • <strong>"Peace, contentment and love from a job well done."</strong> -- Sally Duros




  • <strong>"The absence of want. I have everything I need and I do what I love."</strong> -- Bouaketh Chanthavisouk




  • <strong>"The moment when you don't miss anything."</strong> -- Andrea Szente




  • <strong>"Following your bliss."</strong> -- Kim Fox




  • <strong>"Keepin' it real."</strong> -- Susanna Speier




  • <strong>"Healthy body + peaceful mind = happiness." </strong>-- Sanam Nour




  • <strong>"Selflessness."</strong> -- David Bader




  • <strong>"When you're at peace with the world."</strong> -- Pedro E. Thormodsen




  • <strong>"When you don't know what you've done and still you feel delighted ... thats happiness to me." </strong>-- Nishant Sinha




  • <strong>"Family."</strong> -- Phil Bundy




  • <strong>"Inner confidence and peace."</strong> -- Lisa Simone




  • <strong>"The byproduct of living a good life."</strong> -- Erica Peterson




  • <strong>"Slice of pie, and no one hassling me." -</strong>- Genevieve S. Jenner




  • <strong>"Knowing yourself."</strong> -- Dmitry Lambrianov




  • <strong>"Music!"</strong> -- Caitlin Tremblay




  • <strong>"Anything you give without expecting any return!"</strong> -- Rolando Vargas Soneja




  • <strong>"Pure love."</strong> -- Ekaterina Vitkina




  • <strong>"Feeling my chest, my heart space expand with love and excitement for just being in that moment."</strong> -- Zen Sensor




  • <strong>"A stack of books."</strong> -- Mary Jane Butler




  • <strong>"A smile from the inside out." </strong>-- Saundie Isaak




  • <strong>"Liking yourself and not having to explain why." </strong>-- Joanne Lawson




  • <strong>"Knowing the difference between what I can and cannot do anything about, and between what is my business and what is not my business and what is not anybody else's business."</strong> -- Denise Helberg Snider




  • <strong>"Seeking and becoming my original self."</strong> -- Leo O'Mara




  • <strong>"Grace, strength, ease, freedom.</strong> -- Ina Sahaja Yoga




  • <strong>"Peace...yes, inner peace. Not having any turmoil in my head."</strong> -- Martha Contreras




  • <strong>"A day off, with no hurried plans, and a slice of homemade strawberry rubarb pie, while reading a good book."</strong> -- Cynthia Amaro