Robert Waldinger, a Harvard psychiatrist is the director of the longest -range study of human contentment ever conducted, the Harvard Study of Adult Development. Beginning in 1938, the study tracked more than 700 people throughout their lives, eventually including their offspring.
What central factor determine life satisfaction? Money? Success? Achievement? None of these, nor other dynamics we often connect with happiness. The central factor that determines life satisfaction is “warm connection with other human beings.”
“The big, surprising take away from the study,” Waldinger says, “is the extent to which your interactions with other human beings affect not just your outlook on life, but how long you stay heathy, how long your brain will stay sharp.” (This Week, Feb. 3, 2023)
When I read that, I remembered a scene from Truman Capote’s Other Voices, Other Rooms. The hero is about to walk along a heavy but rotting beam over a brooding, murky creek. Starting over, stepping gingerly . . . he felt he would never reach the other side. Always he would be balanced there, suspended between land, and in the dark and alone. Then feeling the board shake as Idabel started across, he remembered that he had someone to be together with and he could go on.
Isn’t that our experience? It certainly has been mine. I shiver at the thought of having to go it alone. I get chills when I consider where I might be if at the right time I had not felt the board shake because someone was walking with me!
Dr. Waldinger’s study underscores a cardinal aspect of our Christian faith. The Christian walk is a shared journey. We do not walk alone; others walk with us. Paul stated it boldly as he gave guidance for our journey together: Bear one’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:2)
Our journey is a shared one, and we need to be more intentional in our walk with others.