“Personal relationships are the fertile soil from which all advancement, all success, all achievement in real life grows.” – Ben Stein

“Even the Lone Ranger didn’t do it alone.” – Harvey MacKay

Do you know what the key to being happy really is? What if I were to tell you that a study formulated to discover the key to human happiness had been ongoing for over 80 years and had found a consistent and surprisingly simple answer?

Before I divulge the details, a little background. In their new book “The Good Life”, researchers Robert Waldinger and Marc Schulz offer up what makes people happy from an amazing study started in 1938 during the Great Depression. Scientists began tracking the health of 268 Harvard sophomores, hoping the study would reveal clues to leading healthy and happy lives. According to the researchers, it is the world’s longest scientific study of happiness to date. The ongoing study, which has now expanded to include the spouses and children of those original participants, consists of over 2,000 people. 

The researchers gathered participants’ health records every five years, conducted DNA tests along the way, and received questionnaires about their lives and well-being every two years. Roughly every 15 years, the researchers met the participants in-person for an interview. 

In other words, this is about as extensive a study as can be imagined. The researchers followed the participants’ lives in hopes of finding a shared, common key to happiness – which they believe they did. 

So what was the answer? Money? Travel? Spirituality? Hobbies? Possessions? Good health? 

As it turns out, the one truly consistent element of human happiness here on this poor planet is simple, strong relationships with other humans. So consistent, in fact, the authors of the book state that strong relationships between us “…are intrinsic to everything we do and everything we are.”

And, with that being the case, the authors warned how easily it is to be swept right by those relationships while caught inside the vortex of everything that is life outside of them. 

When participants were asked how they overcame adversity, be it illness, war memories, and/or losses, their “life connections” always remained a consistent cornerstone of hope in their lives. Could be the person who lent them money when they didn’t have anywhere to turn, someone who offered good counsel in a trying time, or a fellow soldier who kept them afloat when they fought (remember, given the time frame of this study many of the participants served in wars). 

As they aged, the participants who shared regrets mainly bemoaned how little time they spent with family and friends, and conversely how much they focused on and cared about the seemingly trivial things too many anchor themselves on – particularly success and money. 

“It’s not that accomplishment isn’t important and satisfying. It is,” Waldinger writes in the book. “But when we sacrifice our [relationships], that’s when we end up regretting it, and living a life that isn’t as good as we might have.”

Now, if learning this bothers you because you feel as if you don’t have the strong relationships you really need in your life, researchers also point out that you are far from alone, and that it’s never too late to improve your connections with people who matter to you. 

“Social fitness” means taking stock of your relationships (both real and virtual) and working on them through time, Waldinger says. Ask yourself, which relationships energize you? Who do you appreciate the most, and how can you incorporate them into your life in new ways? Do you want to make new connections? And, which ones bring you down? 

Even the people we consider close friends can begin to slide down the priority list as we age. 

“We grow. We change. Our lives change,” Waldinger said. “But some of it is that we can be intentional, saying, ‘this person I want to keep in my life.’ That’s the intentional part I want to point to.”

The best way to improve your “social fitness”? Schedule time to build relationships into your week, as you would a session at the gym or a work meeting.

Of course, social media and online interaction are now relationship realities. Things like Facebook can connect and reconnect relationships that otherwise wouldn’t exist. Use technology to cultivate relationships rather than feel more distant from them. 

But, he warns, check in with yourself after 10 minutes online, and ask yourself how you feel. Notice if you feel more energized and excited by connecting with some, or depressed and more lonely with others. Doing so should give you an indication of which types of media benefit you and which relationships through it do as well.

So how much time do we actually spend interacting with each other? The answer may surprise you. Research from 2018 found that the average American spent eleven hours a day interacting with media, from television to radio to smartphones (and that’s probably worse today). That adds up to 18 years of life from age 40 to age 80. By contrast, if you have a friend that you see once a week for a coffee hour, that adds up to just 87 days.

Sobering, isn’t it? 

Find people who lift your spirit and spend as much real time with them as you can. You’ll be happy you did – and in many more ways than one.