A busy weekend for fun and frolic around Capitol Hill — Vibrations festival, Bike-In, Melrose Market Street Fair, BadWill market —  will also be a happy weekend as Seattle University hosts the first-ever Seattle Happiness Conference.

It might sound silly — but happiness is a serious global issue:

What organizers are calling the first comprehensive conference on national happiness will be held Friday and Saturday at Seattle University’s Campion Ballroom.

The event brings together more than 150 professionals and activists from as far away as South Africa, and from more than a dozen U.S. states for discussions that range from economic and policy decisions affecting happiness to personal change.

Organizers see this as a way to begin to implement the United Nations’ call to refocus national policies on happiness, they said in a press release.

Here’s more from the UN on the initiative to forge a “new economic paradigm” measured by “social and environmental progress.” Capitol Hill seems like an excellent place to host the conference what with our extremely high gross happiness index.

Tickets for the Friday-Saturday conference are $55 or day passes are available for $35. It also sounds like author Eric Weiner’s keynote is free and open to the public on Saturday.