Dr. George Vaillant, MD, directs the Study of Adult Development at Harvard University. He’s searching for “a theoretical framework, as well as data, for understanding how older people end up fulfilled or not.” Among his findings:

* It is not the bad things that happen to us that doom us; it is the good people who happen to us at any age that facilitate enjoyable old age.
* Healing relationships are facilitated by a capacity for gratitude, for forgiveness, and for taking people inside. (By this metaphor I mean becoming eternally enriched by loving a particular person.)
* A good marriage at age 50 predicted positive aging at 80. But surprisingly, low cholesterol levels at age 50 did not.
* Alcohol abuse-unrelated to unhappy childhood-consistently predicted unsuccessful aging, in part because alcoholism damaged future social supports.
* Learning to play and create after retirement and learning to gain younger friends as we lose older ones add more to life’s enjoyment than retirement income.
* Objective good physical health was less important to successful aging than subjective good health. By this I mean that it is all right to be ill as long as you do not feel sick. (via About.com)

Ah, but what about those who do feel sick? That’s our challenge…

For more, see Dr. Vaillant’s book, Aging Well.