The ferry ride from Helsinki’s city center to the island of Pihlajasaari takes only 10 minutes and deposits visitors at a playground of beaches, trails and rocky shoals excellent for sunbathing. But I had a different mission: to speak to a tree.
This was meant to be a therapeutic exercise, one championed by the Finnish biologist Adela Pajunen. Finns, she’d told me, sometimes share their worries aloud to trees or birds. Occasionally, they may even sing to them.
On shore, I followed a gravel path in search of the perfect tree. I ruled out several pines before spotting a short black alder. I clambered onto a rock and began to tell the alder my woes: I’d been romantically involved with someone who just told me he wasn’t ready for a relationship. Still, I told the alder, I was hopeful things might yet work out. He and I had kept in touch, sending voice messages back and forth. The alder’s leaves rustled in response, a sign I interpreted as sympathy.
I had come to Finland to see whether I could bring happiness back to America with me. Finland has topped the World Happiness Report for the past eight years, a merit largely attributed to the Nordic welfare state, trust in the government, and public policies like free education and universal health care. Under these criteria, living in the United States (No. 24 on the list) is practically a recipe for misery. But the Finns also find contentment in more attainable ways, such as their close relationship with nature (74 percent of the country is covered by forest) and visiting the sauna daily (there are three million saunas for a population of 5.5 million).
Visit Finland, the country’s tourism agency, uses the happiness ranking to entice travelers. And it appears to be working. Tourism is up to almost five million visitors in 2024 from about two million in 2022. Last June, it hosted its second “Find Your Inner Finn” master class, awarding winners chosen from a social media challenge a free trip to Helsinki to learn from five locals known as “happiness hackers,” including Ms. Pajunen and D.J. Orkidea, a top Nordic electronic music performer.
I didn’t enter the contest, but I liked the idea. Like many other Americans, I’ve struggled with unhappiness since the pandemic hit, sometimes experiencing anxious dreams, feelings of dread and crushing loneliness. So I sought out some advice from the happiness hackers, and planned a trip to Helsinki last June to put it all to the test.
The hackers armed me with various solutions, both for the trip and to use on my return to the United States. Luka Balac, a co-owner of the zero-waste restaurant Nolla, gave me a list of local dishes (including licorice ice cream and savory rye-crusted Karelian pies) that would tie me back to nature. Lena Salmi, a vibrant 71-year-old who skateboards and swims, spoke about her intense focus on the diving board. And Tero Kuitunen, a ceramist, suggested doing something, anything, by hand — read, pick berries, fish, knit. And several told me to visit the saunas.
These activities each contained similar goals: Stay present and strive for a communal, minimalist lifestyle that relies on the earth. Frank Martela, a happiness expert and assistant professor at Aalto University, just outside Helsinki, explained that Finns often brag when their summer cabins aren’t equipped with dishwashers, or even running water.
“That would be considered almost cheating,” he said.
A Nordic Education
Shortly after landing in Helsinki, I dropped my bags at the Hotel Fabian and headed to the waterside sauna and restaurant Loyly (which means “steam”). I’d expected the place to be quiet and calm with tinkling music; instead, I came upon a loud group of Finnish men drinking beer in their swim trunks.
As is custom, I alternated between short stints in the wood-fired sauna and the Baltic waters, frigid even in June, reached via a ladder from the sun deck. Research has shown that cold plunges have physical benefits, but Finns also view the activity as a mental exercise — a way of staying present. I set a goal of 30 seconds. The water was so biting that all I could think about was counting to 30. Did that count as staying present? I pawed against the chop, trying not to drown.
When I emerged, a rush of accomplishment overcame me. I repeated the circuit twice, and by the time I left, I felt a sense of ecstasy as my skin seemed to glow and my mind decluttered.
Happiness came in waves and troughs over the next few days, though. I got a hit of endorphins at a different and more tranquil sauna, Lonna, and unwound while eating salmon soup recommended by Mr. Balac. Then I found myself crying in the hotel room after ruining my shoes in the rain, overwhelmed by the elusive promise of happiness in this faraway country where I knew no one. Had I fallen prey to a marketing ploy?
On my final morning, I took a 20-minute ferry ride to the rugged island of Vallisaari, intending to take one last relaxing forest walk along a 1.8-mile trail. But as the boat puttered away, I began having a panic attack. “Today is the perfect day to be happy,” a painted wooden sign read, but loneliness and isolation had followed me halfway across the world.
That night I’d planned to hit a karaoke bar to test out one of D.J. Orkidea’s happiness hacks — communal dancing — after having dinner at the sustainable, Michelin-starred restaurant Gron. But I slipped into bed instead. As I wrote in my journal, “Sometimes happiness is a hotel bathrobe and snuggling under the covers.”
Still, I was optimistic that I could recreate the happiest moments of this trip back home in New York, even if I had to get creative — say, a forest walk in Central Park.
How hard could it be, really?
The American Reality
As it turns out, happiness is a luxury in America — a privilege, even. I was dismayed to find that most sauna passes in New York cost upward of $60. As a freelance journalist, I could not afford to steam like the Finns — many of whom have access to saunas in their homes or apartment buildings.
But I eventually found a place in Brooklyn that offered a reasonable deal and on Friday evenings began visiting its backyard barrel sauna, soaking tub and one-person cold plunge. It wasn’t Helsinki, but the space was tucked away enough to give an aura of serenity.
Because I was not about to forage for my own food like the Finns, I tried the next best thing: shopping at the farmers’ market. I also purchased a pot containing basil, thyme, chive and sage plants with the intent of becoming a gardener. Anna Nyman, a forager who lives about 30 minutes from the Helsinki city center, told me that she once grew produce and herbs on her balcony and therefore other city dwellers could, too. “I even had a watermelon growing,” she said.
My kitchen does not get much sunlight, so every morning I carried my little garden to the roof. Some nights I went out drinking and forgot about it. Summer storms soaked the soil. One evening I chopped the basil stem too low and was left with a barren nub. Everything eventually died, and someone tossed out the pot.
All in all, however, things were going pretty well. I even had a breakthrough one afternoon as I rushed through Central Park after an emotional therapy session and noticed a cluster of people staring at the ground. I flicked my eyes to the asphalt. A cardinal! I stopped to admire the bird’s red plumage before it flapped away. This was a win, I decided, for staying present.
A ‘Simple’ Discovery
Then in late July, the man I’d been involved with texted me to say he had started seeing someone. I soon learned that he’d actually gotten married.
I tried to channel sisu, a Finnish word meaning perseverance, but my mood fluctuated for weeks. Sometimes all it took was a brisk nature walk for the dopamine to kick in. Other times I ate very little or cried at random, once while chopping a farm-picked tomato I’d bought for the purposes of this experiment. Soon, even the sauna no longer lifted my spirits.
I was sitting at the beach one afternoon, wondering why nature was not making me feel better, when the answer hit me: I was trying too hard to live exactly like the Finns. I’d been so bogged down trying to find the time and money for the happiness hacks that I’d missed the point of what all the hackers were saying: Quiet the mind, and find pleasure in small acts and observations — like a cardinal taking flight, or talking to trees. “Simple things,” Ms. Pajunen had said. “This is at the core of what Finns have to offer the rest of the world.”
One Saturday, I forced myself to get dressed and walk my dog in Central Park. I said hello to the European lindens and northern red oaks as we strolled near the zoo. Immediately I felt better. But before we moved on, I carried out a small but comforting ritual I’d developed. I thanked the trees for listening.
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