№ 797. Is ‘Joyspan’ the Key to Aging Well? A long life doesn’t matter much if you don’t enjoy it.

Amorsolo

№ 774. Destinational Living

Author Annie Dillard wrote that “how we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives”. So, how was it that I spent a large portion of my 20s​­ terrified of the big, long life I had before me? After Stanford University, I’d moved to New York to work at Google but I was depressed, anxious.

When I realised that many brilliant and accomplished people were also secretly miserable, just trying to make it through the day, I looked for terminology to describe this, but there was none. So I came up with my own: the underfulfilled overachiever, or UFOA. This describes a constant striver who is living a great‑­on‑­paper life, yet feels disconnected from their work, life and self. UFOAs see success as the organising principle of our lives. We call it by a catchy name: hustle culture. We brag about our intense busyness. Side hustles are a badge of honour. Going “above and beyond” in our jobs is routine. Our primary purpose, unabashedly, is achievement.

Most of us were shaped around expectations from the beginning. We praise kids for being “good students”, by which we don’t mean curious and engaged. We mean high grades and awards. Our education system is built on this principle. This means prioritising productivity – achievement’s codependent ­partner – above almost all else. The central question becomes: “How can I be the most productive today?”

The way we’ve been taught to “do” life is all wrong. “Destinational living”, by which we pursue recognisable outcomes based on the lie that these will guarantee security and happiness, is an “end justifies the means” philosophy. Destinational living says: “Decide what you want your life to look like, come up with a 10-​­year plan, and then work backward to determine the most advantageous place to start.” In the abstract, this is a lovely idea. There’s a reason why it’s the dominant cultural paradigm. It’s comforting to believe that the world is so predictable that we can plot it all out in­ advance. If only it were true.

But if this is supposed to guarantee our happiness, why do almost 50% of millennials report symptoms of depression and/or anxiety disorders and ­84% report burnout? And why are these numbers rising? Those are not metrics of success by anyone’s definition. Clearly, our system is broken. The problem is the expectation that with achievement comes fulfilment. It’s not about the most enjoyable way to get to work or being and feeling well during your day; it’s about what each choice can earn you.

Destinational Living means outsourcing our decision-making. What is impressive, what is ­valuable, is defined not by what matters to us personally but, rather, by what matters to others. In effect, we’re “life plagiarising”. It’s asking, “what did that person do to achieve such success?” and then turning around and saying, “OK, got it. Copy, paste”.

What most UFOAs eventually learn the hard way is that being, or appearing, successful (becoming a CEO, parent, spouse, homeowner) is a different experience from being fulfilled. Fulfilment is a deep sense of belonging to yourself.

№ 771. 25 Habits

 

№ 740. Money = Happiness?!

X

№ 692. Trust in the Process

Cracked

“You can have flaws, be anxious and even be angry, but just remember that your life is the world’s biggest enterprise. Only you can stop it from failing. You are appreciated, admired, and loved by so many. 

 

Remember that happiness is not having a sky without storms, a road without accidents, a job without effort, a relationship without disappointments.

 

№ 687. 8 Habits for Longer Lives

Want to live up to an additional 24 years? Just add eight healthy lifestyle choices to your life at age 40 and that could happen, according to a new unpublished study analyzing data on US veterans. 

• No. 1: First on the list was exercise, which many experts say is one of the most important behaviors anyone can do to improve their health.

• No. 2: Not becoming addicted to opioids was the second most important contributor to a longer life, reducing the risk of early death by 38%, the study found.

• No. 3: Never using tobacco reduced risk of death by 29%, the study found.

• No. 4: Managing stress was next, reducing early death by 22%, the study found. Stress is rampant in the US today, with devastating consequences for health, experts say. And there are ways to revamp your outlook and turn bad stress into good stress.

• No. 5: Eating a plant-based diet would raise your chances of living a longer life by 21%, the study found. But that doesn’t mean you have to be a vegetarian or vegan, Nguyen said. Following a healthy plant-based plan such as the Mediterranean diet full of whole grains and leafy green vegetables was key.

• No. 6: Avoiding binge drinking — which is having more than four alcoholic beverages a day — was another healthy lifestyle habit, reducing the risk of death by 19%.

• No. 7: Getting a good night’s sleep — defined as at least seven to nine hours a night with no insomnia — reduced early death from any cause by 18%, Nguyen said. Dozens of studies have linked poor sleep to all sorts of poor health outcomes, including premature mortality.

• No. 8: Being surrounded by positive social relationships helped longevity by 5%, the study found. However, loneliness and isolation, especially among older adults, is becoming more widespread and worrisome, experts say.

№ 666. Friendships 2

Preview

 

From the Friendship Files: Milton and Mike

Every Saturday morning for decades, Milton Ehrlich and his best friend, Mike, scoured garage sales near their homes in New Jersey, searching for books, records and antique bottles. But when Mike was in his 70s, he started losing his memory. Once, he wandered off from a garage sale and got lost. The police had to find him.

 

Determined not to lose their weekly date, Milton, who is now 91, began to call his friend every Saturday instead, playing for him their favorite music from the 1940s, including Duke Ellington and Sarah Vaughn. “Even though, by that time, Mike was having a hard time remembering what happened yesterday, the music always transported him,” Milton said. “He could sing along with lyrics and remember melodies from music that was 75 years old.”

The calls buoyed them both. When Milton’s wife passed away in 2021, after 67 years of “happy marriage,” the weekly ritual with Mike “became one of the last close personal connections in my life,” he said. His brothers died long ago, as did most of his friends. Milton and Mike exchanged only a few words between songs. For the most part, they just listened.

“It was a way of remaining tethered to my old buddy,” Milton said. “We would sit there, our houses about a mile apart in a small suburban town, each of us in our rocking chairs, staying connected to each other through the music of our teenage years.”

Mike died in October and, with him, a library of stories — about the best places to eat in Little Italy, about the clarinetist Mezz Mezzrow and the cornetist Bix Beiderbecke and about the things you could buy for a nickel at Coney Island, Milton said. He was 90 years old. — Catherine Pearson

№ 665. Friendships

12 Ideas to Boost Your Happiness

 

Amy Pechukas met her friend Al in 2018 when she rented the apartment under his in Northampton, Mass. They didn’t connect immediately. Amy, now 42, worked four jobs and thought Al, 76, was a curmudgeon with questionable boundaries. He helped look after their two-family home and would frequently enter her apartment to check on her two cats and two dogs.

But Al’s peculiar brand of kindness grew on her. “He often pops in for a conversation spontaneously, at times when I need a lift, and we end up talking for hours,” she said. “We go for evening walks and argue about the route.”

Covid brought them even closer. During lockdown, they would meet in the driveway to talk about the virus or politics. Amy made a Thanksgiving meal, which they ate outside on their porch with electric blankets on their laps. They have celebrated the holiday together ever since.

Al can still be overbearing. He has firm ideas about the way things should be done around the home, like the “right” way to rake the leaves. Every summer, he frets that Amy’s elderly cat, who grows lazy in the heat, is on the verge of death.

But Amy feels deep gratitude for their unexpected friendship, and for the constant, unselfish care Al has shown her and her pets. “When my dog got very sick a year ago and needed me to do round-the-clock care for her, I would come home on occasion to find Al in my kitchen doing my dishes,” she recalled. “‘You can’t do everything, Amy,’ he’d say. ‘You’re doing a great job.’”

Though Al does not say it outright, Amy knows he worries she might move out. She recently interviewed for a position out of state, and Al told her several times that it sounded terrible — reminding her that there were other jobs closer by.

“We just have a lot of fun,” she said. “We like to quote movie lines endlessly, we’ll do that for, like, two hours straight. Last winter we went ice skating in the cemetery because it was flooded. Al’s just a good person.” — Catherine Pearson

№ 653. Resilience

 

Adam Grant

 

№ 617. La Dolce Far Niente

The idea that “doing nothing” is actually an event in and of itself. The idea that we no longer run on a treadmill of activity from getting the kids ready for school, to brushing our teeth, to conference calls, to picking up kids, fixing dinner, and bed- only to start over again. The idea that our actions day to day become influenced by our instincts and no longer by routines, shoulds, and musts.

 

 

 

№ 601. V for Volunteers

“Volunteering is one of the best, most certain ways we can find a purpose and meaning in our life,” said Val Walker, the author of “400 Friends and No One to Call: Breaking Through Isolation and Building Community.”

 

Pickles

In a study of 10,000 volunteers in Britain, about two-thirds agreed that their volunteering had helped them feel less isolated, particularly those ages 18 to 34.