The purpose of this paper is to introduce the meaning of happiness that teacher educators can suggest to prospective early childhood teachers. For this purpose, the author emphasized that the meaning of happiness should be approached at an academic level rather than at a common-sense level. In the first step of the discussion, the difference between academic and popular methods for defining the meaning of happiness was examined. After analyzing previous studies that have been dealt with at an academic level, the limitations of their research methods based on scientism were discussed. Next, as an alternative understanding of happiness, a cycle of adversity and achievement was proposed, and several conditions that prospective early childhood teachers should consider to understand the phenomenon of happiness were explained. The conclusions drawn from this discussion are as follows. Firstly, happiness is not simply a matter of feeling good emotions by chance opportunities. It is connected to the attitude towards life, which requires the pursuer of happiness to be faithful to the inherent nature of happiness. Secondly, happiness cannot be evaluated by universal measurement units and numbers from the perspective outside individuals involved, as if measuring physical facts. The evaluation of happiness refers to a subjective assessment in which the subject of happiness reflects on how faithfully they are keeping the inherent nature of happiness. Thirdly, for this reason, the size of happiness is relative, and the possibility of increasing the frequency of happiness depends on the subject's ability and effort.