[rthomas6]

Subjective wellbeing, stress hormone levels, and fMRI readings would all be good ways to measure happiness in my opinion. When I wrote the above, I was thinking of Buddhist monks, but I didn't want to imply other monastic disciplines were somehow lesser, so I just said "monks". I do not have any direct proof of monks being happier, but there are TONS of scientific studies showing better results for experienced meditators on the indicators mentioned at the beginning of this comment.