Ramsgate, the Happiness Pie, and the Question of Place

I changed my circumstances on Friday.

I moved from a neat village in Surrey, to Ramsgate on the Kent coast. And I found myself thinking again about the happiness pie.

Have you heard of it?

It is Sonja Lyubomirsky’s theory suggests that happiness breaks down roughly like this:

• around 50% is a relatively stable “set point”, shaped early in life by genetics, upbringing, education, and background - a point we generally return to no matter what happens to us.

• ONLY 10% is down to our circumstances (even though this is where we often try to make changes first when we are unhappy!)

• 40% HOWEVER comes from the value of our intentional actions and patterns of thought….

The message from this is clear: changing your circumstances won’t really make you happier. If you want to feel better, work on your mindset. Practise gratitude. Stop telling yourself you’ll be happy when.

I agree with this only partially.

It is absolutely true that I’ve seen, again and again, how powerful it is to focus on gratitude for current circumstances rather than living in an “I’ll be happy when…” future. Thoughts and mindset matter enormously.

But I’ve never been enormously convinced by the “arbitrary” numbers — especially the 10%.

A later mathematical analysis showed that the percentages don’t actually add up in the way they’re presented. And more importantly, the model isn’t nuanced enough. Long-term health conditions, caring responsibilities, trauma, financial pressure — these don’t sit neatly in a small “circumstances” slice…..

Circumstances may not entirely remove choice, but they do influence the cost of certain actions and interpretations, how sustainable they feel, and which thoughts about our lives are most readily available to us!

Ramsgate beach in January

I do believe that place and environment may have a profound impact on wellbeing — when they’re in integrity with who you are.

For me it is like this. Some places contain us. Others stretch us. At certain points in our life, being contained may be required I don’t know!

The seaside has always attracted wild women for a reason. It’s exposed, changeable, and unapologetically alive. This morning I woke to properly wild weather: waves crashing, wind howling, rain lashing my face as I dragged a reluctant dog out. A far cry from the sunrise on Saturday morning!

This morning in the wet, wild weather

It was uncomfortable and bracing, but …..kind of expansive?

It’s certainly a long way from the tameness I have moved from in Thames Ditton in Surrey — from clipped hedges, moderated lives, and a perceived quiet pressure to behave, which makes my friend Fenella - of the wigs and vertiginous heels - stick out like a sore thumb. Comfortable, perhaps. But, for me at least, contracting.

My darling Fun (Fenella) who was a good influence…

When a place fits, it doesn’t necessarily soothe you. Sometimes it creates the conditions for growth — for risk, honesty, movement. And that matters when we talk about happiness.

Because intentional action — how we live, what we choose, what we dare — is always expressed somewhere. And for me, some environments invite expansion, while others subtly reward staying small.

I love this stick library near East Cliffe

In defence of the power of the value of intentional thoughts and actions, in Man’s Search for Meaning, Frankl wrote that the last of human freedoms is the ability to choose our relationship to our circumstances. He was writing about meaning, values, and purpose — not the denial of reality (and his was starkly not chosen), but our stance toward it.

That idea has become much more complicated in modern life.

We now have more choice than ever before: about where we live, who we partner with, what we tolerate. In the past, people often stayed in unhappy marriages or unsatisfying lives because they had little alternative. They had “made their bed” and “mustn’t grumble”. Today, we are less willing to put up with circumstances that don’t fit.

That freedom is powerful — and it comes at a cost. More choice can mean higher expectations, more restlessness, and a persistent sense that we should be happier than we are.

Happiness, it turns out, is shaped not just by circumstance or mindset, but by how we live with choice itself.

A lot of people have told me they don’t understand this move at all. If you’re a Surrey person, there’s meant to be a trajectory to perhaps Cornwall, Devon or Dorset.

Ramsgate, Kent doesn’t fit the script. Planet Thanet has a reputation.

Like most UK seaside towns, it’s marked by sharp inequality. People like me — politely or otherwise known as DFLs, Down From London — arrive with choice and mobility. Alongside that sits poverty, limited opportunity, and lives that are far less optional.

I’m not naïve about that. If anything, it’s part of the point.

I was brought up in Sittingbourne — probably an even less salubrious place than Ramsgate — so this doesn’t feel like slumming it or a coastal fantasy. It feels familiar. Uneven. Real.

I’m an hour and sixteen minutes from London. Close enough to stay connected.

And I intend to get more stuck in here in Thanet — to be of service to the community here in ways I haven’t always felt were that needed before.

Ramsgate may or may not make me happier.

But it feels like a place where growth, integrity, and contribution can coexist.

It just feels right.

This place just doesn’t look open ever - but it IS! Perched at the end of the jetty it has great seafood.