“One thing continuously demonstrates its broad and enduring importance … ”

BY BILL MURPHY JR., WWW.BILLMURPHYJR.COM@BILLMURPHYJR

For Inc.

Photo: Getty Images

This is a story about simple habits to improve your happiness and fulfillment. It’s inspired by key findings of a huge Harvard University study of happiness, one that’s now gone on for more than 80 years.

Maybe you’ve heard about this research: It’s the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which has followed more than 700 men — and now, in some cases, their families — from the late 1930s until today.

The study’s current leaders have a new book out: The Good Life: Lessons from the World’s Longest Scientific Study of Happiness. I don’t mind admitting that I devoured this book, start to finish.

Who doesn’t want to live a better life? Who doesn’t want to be happier? And co-authors Robert Waldinger and Marc Schulz give you the bottom line right up front:

“For 84 years (and counting), the Harvard Study has tracked the same individuals, asking thousands of questions and taking hundreds of measurements to find out what really keeps people healthy and happy…

[O]ne crucial factor stands out… [I]t’s not career achievement, or exercise, or a healthy diet. Don’t get us wrong; these things matter (a lot). But one thing continuously demonstrates its broad and enduring importance:

Good relationships.

[I]f we had to take all 84 years of the Harvard Study and boil it into a single principle for living, one life investment that is supported by similar findings across a wide variety of other studies, it would be this:

Good relationships keep us healthier and happier. Period.”

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