Connection matters

The Harvard Study on Adult Development followed a group of people for over 80 years to learn the foundations of human happiness. It’s the longest scientific study of its kind. And the answer is clear: good relationships.

In their book “The Good Life,” Marc S. Schulz and Robert J. Waldinger write we often assume happiness comes down to how much money we make, what job or job title we have, what our body looks like, how big an impact or contribution we’re making, or how healthy we are.

While all these things can be important, they continue, we humans are ultimately social creatures, wired for connection. At root, we need other people to survive, and the evidence is clear that both our emotional and physical well-being are tied up with the frequency and quality of our interactions with others.

And yet, contemporary society seems bent on disrupting these needs.

This is especially true for those of us in WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic) societies who happen to spend more than our fair share of time on LinkedIn.

Our day-to-day concerns—augmented by social media FOMO, constant technological distraction, and the relentless pressure to do more and be more—encourage us to downplay the significance of relationships.

We assume we never have enough time, we assume that there will always be a “later.” But deep down, we know that later, when we believe we’ll have all the time in the world, is going to look an awful lot like today.

For Schulz and Waldinger, that’s the irony of contemporary success culture: The most successful people are all too often the least happy because their success usually comes at the expense of relationships and meaning.

Yet, meeting this problem means not only changing the individual actors within the system but also the system itself.

What would our workplaces and communities look like if we took relationships seriously? What would you be willing to do—or give up—to get there?