By Sandee LaMotte, CNN Updated 2:06 PM ET, Sat October 5, 2019
(CNN)If you could wish for just one thing, would it
be happiness or a long life? Given what researchers tell us, one is likely to
produce the other.
Science has been exploring the connection
between happiness and longevity for some time. A 2011 analysis of nearly 4,000 Brits found
those who said they felt content, happy or excited on a typical day were up to
35% less likely to die prematurely. In a 2016 study, a positive outlook was associated with
longer life for nearly 4,000 older French men and women studied over 22 years.
Researchers followed more
than 2,000 Mexican-Americans in 2015 and found those who were more positive in
their world view were half as likely to die. And a 2011 study followed around 200 women and
men from San Francisco over 13 years and found those who reported more positive
than negative experiences also lived longer.
According to research on the Positive
Psychology Center website, striving for well-being will allow you to
perform better at work, have better relationships, a stronger immune system,
fewer sleep problems, lower levels of burnout, better physical health and --
you'll live longer.
Great! But how do you obtain happiness? That's
the tough question, especially since the meaning of the word isn't even
scientifically agreed upon.
"Happiness comes in different sizes and
flavors," said cardiologist Dr. Alan Rozanski, a professor of medicine at
the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai who studies optimism.
"There is the transient type, fed by such
things as a walk in a park, spending time with a friend, or eating that ice
cream you love," he continued. "But these feelings of happiness come
and go."
What creates a sustained feeling of happiness,
say experts, is a mixture of traits like optimism and resilience, fed by
behaviors such as expressing gratitude, forgiveness and being kind to others,
all held together by a strong sense of purpose.
Add to that mix one master ingredient: a sense
of community characterized by warm, supportive, satisfying relationships with
others.
Now that we have something of a working recipe
for happiness, let's find the ingredients.
Satisfying social
connections
"People who are more socially connected
to family, to friends, to community, are happier, they're physically healthier,
and they live longer than people who are less well connected," said
Harvard psychiatrist Robert Waldinger in his popular TEDx talk.
"And the experience of loneliness turns out to be toxic."
Waldinger is the fourth director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which
followed the lives of 724 Boston men for more than 75 years and then began
following more than 2,000 of their offspring and their wives.
Among the original recruits in the study were
President John F. Kennedy and longtime Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee.
The unprecedented study has allowed
researchers to get closer to determining the main characteristics of a happy
life.
"The lessons aren't about wealth or fame
or working harder and harder," Waldinger said. "The clearest message
that we get from this 75-year study is this: Good relationships keep us happier
and healthier. Period."
You don't have to have dozens of friends or
even be in a committed relationship, he stresses.
"It's the quality of your close
relationships that matters," Waldinger said. "High-conflict
marriages, for example, without much affection, turn out to be very bad for our
health, perhaps worse than getting divorced. And living in the midst of good,
warm relationships is protective."
Looking on the bright
side
Optimism and pessimism are the yin and yang of
happiness. Optimists are people who expect good things to happen to them, while
pessimists expect bad things to happen.
It turns out that looking on the bright side
of life is really good for your health. Research has found a direct link
between optimism and a stronger immune system, better lung function and cardiac health.
A recent meta-analysis of
studies found that compared to pessimists, an optimist had about a 35% lower
risk of major heart complications, such as a cardiac death, stroke or a heart
attack.
"In fact, the more positive the person,
the greater the protection from heart attacks, stroke and any cause of
death," said Mt. Sinai's Rozanski, who was the lead author on the study.
There are a lot of reasons why a positive
outlook might improve your physical health and help you live longer. It reduces the stress hormone cortisol, which
controls inflammation, blood sugar and blood pressure levels, all key factors
in disease development.
Optimists also have better health
habits. They're more likely to exercise,
have better diets and are less likely to smoke.
"Optimists also tend to have better
coping skills and are better problem-solvers," Rozanski said. "They
are better at what we call proactive coping, or anticipating problems and then
proactively taking steps to fix them."
Whatever the reasons, a 2019 study of nearly 6,000 people from
Harvard's Health and Retirement study found optimists had a 24% increased
likelihood of maintaining healthy aging.
Meaning and purpose
A sense of purpose and meaning in your life is
a big part of living a longer, happier life, according to psychology professor
Lyle Ungar, who has developed what he calls the Well-Being
Map. It rates every US county on such psychological factors as
openness, trust, agreeableness and neuroticism.
"Do you have a job or a calling that
makes some sense?" Ungar asked in an interview with CNN last year.
"The way to happiness is not by choosing to be happy, it's to find meaning
in life. Go volunteer, spend time at a charity, give something of yourself. The
people who are doing fine in that way are living longer."
Lord Richard Layard, one of Britain's most
prominent economists and the author of several books on happiness, also
believes that to make ourselves happy we should focus on the well-being of
others.
"A society cannot flourish without some
sense of shared purpose," he writes in his landmark book, "Happiness:
Lessons From a New Science."
"If your sole duty is to achieve the best
for yourself, life becomes just too stressful, too lonely -- you are set up to
fail. Instead, you need to feel you exist for something larger, and that very
thought takes off some of the pressure."
Spirituality
Studies by the Pew Research Center show
that actively religious people are more likely than less- or non-religious
people to describe themselves as "very happy." They also share some
traits that could improve their chance at a longer, happy life: They are less
likely to smoke and drink, and more likely to join clubs and volunteer at
charities.
"I'm surprised how good religion is for
people," Ungar said. "Religious people are more agreeable, they're
happier, they live longer."
It doesn't have to be a traditional religion.
Layard points out that spiritual practices ranging from meditation to positive
psychology to cognitive therapy can also feed an inner life.
Flourishing with PERMA
University of Pennsylvania psychologist Martin
Seligman, who co-founded the field of positive psychology, has developed a
theory he believes will enable well-being, which some experts argue is a better
goal than happiness.
Seligman has developed five building blocks toward
well-being he calls "PERMA." Each of them stand
independently of the others, and should be pursued for "its own sake, not
as a means to an end."
"P" stands for positive emotion,
which you can cultivate in hope for the future and an appreciation for the
past. By practicing gratitude for what you've been given and forgiveness for
what you were not, Seligman feels you can create positive emotion about your
past. Build hope and optimism, he says, and you build positive emotions about
your future.
"E" is for engagement, which he
defines as fully using all your skills, strengths and attention on a
challenging task. Doing this, he says, will put you in the "flow,"
sort of a mental version of the athlete's "zone."
"R" is for relationships and the
critical importance they have in our lives in amplifying both our positive and
negative feelings.
"M" is for meaning, a sense of
purpose from being part of something bigger than ourselves. He points to
religion, family and social causes such as working for a better environment as
ways to increase meaning in our lives. Research shows doing acts of kindness
for others can also increase our well-being.
And finally, "A" is for
accomplishment. This is not necessarily financial success, but success and
mastery of a skill or activity for its own sake.
Or as the Dalai Lama has said: "Happiness
is not something ready-made. It comes from your own actions."
https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/30/health/happiness-live-longer-wellness/index.html
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