Robert Waldinger

Lessons on the Good Life

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Love — It’s What Really Makes Us Happy

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BY Andrea Miller , Sept. 13, 2017

About Andrea Miller:  Andrea Miller is a deputy editor of Lion’s Roar magazine and the editor of three anthologies, most recently, All the Rage: Buddhist Wisdom on Anger and Acceptance.  In 2018, Wisdom Publications will release her first children’s book, The Day the Buddha Woke Up.

 

Robert Waldinger is a Zen Priest and leader of the longest-running study of human happiness.  As Andrea Miller tells us, he’s found that science and Buddhism agree on what makes life happy and meaningful.

Robert Waldinger TED talk
Waldinger’s viral TED talk entitled “The Good Life” sparked widespread interest in the Harvard Study of Adult Development.

What makes life worth living? What really makes us happy? As a Zen priest and leader of the one of the most important studies of human happiness ever undertaken, Robert Waldinger has sought the answers to these questions.

What he’s discovered is that science and Buddhism arrive at the same basic answer. They both conclude, he says, that “moving beyond the small self is a huge source of both meaning and contentment.”

Waldinger is a clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard University and director of the famed Harvard Study of Adult Development. It’s perhaps the longest-running study of adult life ever conducted. For seventy-five continuous years, it has tracked the lives of 724 men in order to understand what makes for a healthy, happy life. Now it’s following the next generation, as it tracks the lives of the original subjects’ children and their families.

The study is one of the most important longitudinal research projects ever undertaken. Over the decades, the scientific community has followed the Study of Adult Development with interest, but the public was largely unaware of it and its findings about what really makes people happy and healthy. Then Robert Waldinger became an internet star.

Read More:  Love- It’s What Really Makes Us Happy/Lion’s Roar

This Is the One Secret You Need to Live a Fulfilling Life

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Hint: It has nothing to do with the health of your bank account.    

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Fulfilling Life

In this day and age, many fall into the trap of defining their self-worth by 401(k) plans and followers on social media—and you could be one of them. But science just offered the perfect reminder that the most important things in life aren’t exactly material.

A 75-year Harvard study analyzed the physical and mental health of two groups of participants, including 456 low-income men in Boston from 1939 to 2014 and 268 male graduates from Harvard’s classes of 1939 to 1944. The researchers spent decades evaluating blood samples, brain scans, self-reported surveys, and personal interactions to determine what made these men feel the most fulfilled.

Their results couldn’t be clearer. “Good relationships keep us happier and healthier. Period,” said Robert Waldinger, director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development.

Having strong, happy relationships in your life relaxes your nervous system, keeps your brain healthy, and reduces both emotional and physical pain, researchers say. (Check out even more scientific benefits of having friends.) They also found that lonely people are more likely to experience an earlier decline in physical health and die younger.

Read more: This is the One Secret You Need to Live a Fulfilling Life/Reader’s Digest

 

For 79 Years, this Groundbreaking Harvard study Has Searched for the Key to Happiness. Should it Keep Going?

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By Colby Itkowitz

For close to 80 years, Harvard University researchers have studied the lives of the same group of men. Since 1938, they’ve tracked their development, documenting every two years details about their physical and emotional health, their employment, their families and their friendships. By looking at human development over a lifespan, the early researchers hoped to find trends that would provide insight into what factors ultimately led to a good life.

The big takeaway from the decades of research and millions of dollars spent on the famous Grant Study is that, as the Beatles sang, all you need is love. It was not money or status that determined a good life. Those who were happiest and healthier reported strong interpersonal relationships, while those who were isolated had declines in mental and physical health as they aged. In November 2015, Robert Waldinger, the director of the program, shared that key finding in a widely popular Ted Talk that has been viewed close to 14 million times — there’s clearly an appetite for learning what to prioritize to have more fulfilling lives.

Read More: For 79 Years, this Groundbreaking Harvard study Has Searched for the Key to Happiness. Should it Keep Going?/TheWashingtonPost

4 Lessons From the Longest-Running Study on Happiness

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By Daryl Chen

Essential, data-derived advice for leading a happy, healthy life, shared by researcher and psychiatrist Robert Waldinger.

Have you ever wished you could fast-forward your life so you could see if the decisions you’re making will lead to satisfaction and health in the future? In the world of scientific research, the closest you can get to that is by looking at the Harvard Study of Adult Development — a study that has tracked the lives of 724 men for 78 years, and one of the longest studies of adult life ever done. Investigators surveyed the group every two years about their physical and mental health, their professional lives, their friendships, their marriages — and also subjected them to periodic in-person interviews, medical exams, blood tests and brain scans.

With a front-row seat on these men’s lives, researchers have been able to track their circumstances and choices and see how the effects ripple through their lives. Psychiatrist Robert J. Waldinger, the study’s director and principal investigator, shared some of the major lessons in a popular TED Talk (What makes a good life? Lessons from the longest study on happiness). He says, ”We’d been publishing journal articles with our findings for 75 years, but we publish in journals about lifespan developmental research that few people read. The government has invested millions of dollars in the research, so why keep it a secret?”

 

Read More: 4 Lessons from the Longest Running Study on Happiness/ Ted.Ideas

Trust Me, I’m Your Smartphone

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Does digital communication affect our sense of belonging?

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 Stephanie Dutchen

Place the winky face emoticon where you think it best fits: Social media makes you feel lonely. Social media makes you feel less alone. Smartphone use damages relationships and facilitates ideological echo chambers. Smartphone use strengthens bonds with others and exposes us to more diverse opinions.

 

 

According to the Pew Research Center, three-quarters of U.S. adults own smartphones and three-quarters of teens own or have access to one. Ninety-two percent of teens go online daily, 24 percent of them “almost constantly.” Ninety percent of teens and 65 percent of adults use social media.

As online life grows and headlines speculate about whether social media will be the downfall or the savior of human civilization, researchers struggle to understand how digitally mediating our interactions deepens or damages our sense of belonging, which in turn could influence the health of individuals, relationships, and communities.

Read More: Trust Me I’m Your Smartphone/HarvardMedicineMagazine

Living the Good Life: Q&A with Harvard Psychiatrist and TEDx Phenom Dr. Robert Waldinger

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by Sarah Perlman

What makes for a happy life? It’s a question we all ask ourselves and continually make strides to answer in different ways and by new means—making more money, moving somewhere new, taking a new job, you name it. Robert Waldinger, renowned Harvard psychiatrist, Zen priest, and psychoanalyst, has spent much of his career researching the answer. He directs the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which at 78 years running (and counting) is likely the longest study of adult life ever done. His TED talk “What makes a good life?” has been viewed over 13 million times, making it one of the most popular TED talks of all time. Here, he shares some of the most inspiring insights about relationships and talks about his own journey to happiness and resilience.

READ MORE: Living the Good Life: Q&A with Harvard Psychiatrist and TEDx Phenom Dr. Robert Waldinger/HuffPost 

Living the Good Life: Q&A with Harvard Psychiatrist and TEDx Phenom Dr. Robert Waldinger/meQuillibrium