Study: Old Age Is the Happiest Time

And here’s why:

“The good news is that with age comes happiness,” said study author Yang Yang, a University of Chicago sociologist. “Life gets better in one’s perception as one ages.” A certain amount of distress in old age is inevitable, including aches, pains and deaths of loved ones and friends. But older people generally have learned to be more content with what they have than younger adults, Yang said. This is partly because older people have learned to lower their expectations and accept their achievements, said Duke University aging expert Linda George. An older person may realize “it’s fine that I was a schoolteacher and not a Nobel prize winner.”

It’s not the first time I’ve heard this notion, and in the words of an elderly neighbour at the last apartment building I lived in, “I just happy to wake up each day. What more do you need?”