Showing results for "Happiness" in Gerontology

What are we going to do with those 20 or 30 years we didn’t expect? Due to unfounded fears of unhappiness and regret, many intelligent, otherwise rational people, even into their 40s and 50s, are so convinced that old age is a time of misery that they simply deny any other outcome and refuse to plan their own destiny. This optimistic and highly informative guide to smart aging will detail for listeners the steps they need to take to ensure that long life becomes synonymous with good life.

In 2015, the award-winning New York Times journalist John Leland set out to meet some of the city's oldest inhabitants for a series on America's fastest-growing age group: those over 85. Leland was at a crossroads in his own life. His marriage had fallen apart, and, at 55, he was alone for the first time. He was also caring for his elderly mother, whose main desire was to die. He understood aging, like many of us do, as nothing more than the relentless deterioration of body, mind, and quality of life.