Thank you for reading my blog.
Some of you may be thinking,
“In order to be happy, you have to make a lot of money.”
“You can’t be happy unless you have status and prestige.”
In this world of diverse ways of living and thinking, is there a universal way to be happy?
Actually, there is.
So this time, I will tell you how to make your life happy, which anyone can do.
The content of this issue is based on The content of this article is based on the research of Professor Robert Waldinger of Harvard Medical School.
It is the result of over 70 years of research and is said to be the longest single study of its kind in history.
Let’s check out what Harvard University has found out as a result of their research over the years to help you live a lifetime of health and happiness.
Harvard reveals how to live a happy, healthy life
Let’s begin by reviewing the study to which I am referring.
The study began in 1938, and the original subjects were two groups of students, one from Harvard University and the other from a poor neighborhood in Boston.
A total of 724 men from two contrasting groups, the so-called elite and wealthy group of students and the group of students from poor families, were the subjects of the study.
And generations of researchers kept them in check every year for more than 70 years, checking their work, family life, and health.
It is a magnificent research study.
Incidentally, more than 2,000 of their children are still part of the study, and the research is ongoing.
So, what was the research’s finding on how to lead a healthy and happy life?
It was to have good relationships.
The study looked at a contrasting group of wealthy, intelligent students and a contrasting group of poor students, and found that the differences were irrelevant to happiness in life.
In other words, some Harvard graduates were not happy, while others were born poor but lived happy lives.
It was relationships that mattered, not birth, academic ability, earning power, amount of assets, or prestige.
Amazing, isn’t it?
And there are three key points to these relationships, according to Professor Waldinger.
The three points are as follows.
1.Social connections are important.
Being lonely is fatal.
Research shows that people who are rich in social connections – family, friends, and community ties – are happier, healthier, and live longer than those who have few such connections.
People who are lonely tend to view themselves as unhappy, their health begins to deteriorate in middle age, their brain function deteriorates faster, and they live shorter lives than those who are not lonely.
2.It is not the number of friends that is important, but the quality.
A life full of conflict is not good for your health.
We found that the best way to tell the difference between those who have happy, healthy 80s and those who do not is to find out if they were satisfied with their relationships in their 50s.
It was not cholesterol levels that mattered.
Notably, it was not the number of friends that mattered.
What mattered was the quality.
In other words, it was more important to have good relationships with friends and family, even if they were fewer in number than others, than it was to have many relationships.
Good and close relationships protect humans from aging.
3.Good relationships protect not only your health, but also your brain.
We found that the memories of those who had a trusting presence were more robust than those who had no one to rely on.
Those who did not have a trusting relationship with anyone had a faster decline in memory.
The study also found that even though couples argue daily, if they feel they can rely on each other, their memory is not impaired.
Research has shown that good relationships maintain physical and brain health and increase feelings of well-being.
However, building good relationships and getting along with friends should be something everyone has been told to do since they were little.
Why is it so difficult to have good relationships? And how can we maintain good relationships?
Let’s find out in the next part.
What you can do from today
First, it is difficult to build trust with others because we are human.
Humans tend to jump to the quickest, easiest way possible.
Relationships are complicated and messy, and working hard for someone other than ourselves doesn’t seem very appealing.
And as we grow older, we are busy with work.
So, even if you have good friends, you see each other less and less because your schedules don’t match up.
So how can we build good relationships?
Instead of staring at social networking sites, Netflix, TVs, and other displays, we should make time to meet with our friends and family in person.
No matter how busy you are at work, it is possible to spend time with friends instead of staring at your display.
It might even be a good idea to contact an old friend you haven’t seen in a while.
Now that the coronavirus has made you a little less likely to see people, why not meet with your dear friends again?
If it is too difficult to meet, a phone call or video call will do.
Spending time alone is important, but for your own happiness, you should also spend time with your friends.
–Postscript–
In this issue, we told you how to live a happy life.
To live a happy and healthy life, above all, we needed to continue to value our relationships.
It wasn’t about money, status, power, or fame.
Once again, spend time with the people who are important to you.
The time itself will be enjoyable and make you happy, and it will also lead to future happiness.
Let me end with a quote from Mark Twain.
He liked to like people, therefore people liked him.
Thank you again for reading to the end of this issue.
See you in my next post!
▪️Reference
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