What is “The Good Life?”

I’ve spent forty-plus years thinking and talking about “the good life” question. With clients, fellow advisors, my family and friends. And while definitive answers are not easy to come by, it’s clear that how we answer (or don’t answer) the question will have a significant impact on the life-defining choices we make, day after day, year after year.

I’ve spent forty-plus years thinking and talking about “the good life” question. With clients. With fellow advisors. With my family and friends. And while definitive answers are not easy to come by, it’s clear that how we answer (or don’t answer) the question will have a significant impact on the life-defining choices we make, day after day, year after year.

How about you? How do you define your good life? And if you have an answer, is it one that fits your day-to-day, real life? Or is it too aspirational, an answer that doesn’t match your true interests and motivations? (Like knowing we shouldn’t eat a lot of fried foods but ordering the French fries anyway.) Maybe the good life looks different to you now than it did when you were younger. Or maybe you haven’t thought much about it at all.

Whatever the case, a little personal reflection can help create a potentially better life for you and the people you care about. There are at least a couple of ways to frame the conversation. What’s good for everyone. And what’s good for me.

ACCORDING TO THE BEST RESEARCH, WHAT PRODUCES LASTING SATISFACTION AND A SENSE OF WELL-BEING?

What’s Good for Everyone?

The longest running observational study of human development is the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which began by tracking 268 men from Harvard in 1938. Later, the research was paired with a dataset of 456 young men of similar age, but from low income, more difficult life circumstances living in and around Boston at the same time. Over the decades, as the men in the study aged, researchers began to assign them into the categories of “happy-well” or “sad-sick.”

Numerous articles referencing this Harvard study conclude that human beings are generally happier and healthier when they are in meaningful relationships, which may include close marriages, supportive family members, or non-family friends. In 2015, Robert Waldinger, the fourth director of this continuous project said, “Good relationships…being well connected to friends, family, and community resulted in better physical health, increased longevity, and happiness.”

Is that it? To have a good life, we simply need to focus on having a few close relationships? Academic research beyond the Harvard study strongly suggests that we all do better when we are in healthy relationships.

In his recent book, A Wealth of Well-Being, Meir Statman approaches the good life question from the lens of well-being as experienced in multiple facets of human life – financial, family, friendship, health, work, religion, society, and education. His research and life experience has led him to conclude that each of these areas can contribute to overall well-being in a kind of balancing act where areas of strength make up for areas of weakness or pain. For instance, good friendships can help counterbalance painful family dynamics. Statman (along with other researchers) also found that a good life includes a degree of financial wellness where our expected lifestyle is reasonably well funded.

SPECIFICALLY, ACCORDING TO MY EXPERIENCE, WHAT PRODUCES A SENSE OF WELL-BEING, SATISFACTION AND CONTENTMENT IN ME?

In David Brooks’s book, The Second Mountain, he relates stories of people who have discovered that a good life often includes commitments in four areas of life. These commitments are to a vocation that calls forth your best efforts and serves others; a marriage with a deep commitment to loving and being loved; a creed, or spiritual sense of how you fit in the universe which for many includes religion and faith; and a community, marked by a meaningful connection to your local context, which could include your neighborhood, church or synagogue, schools, or service and charitable organizations that you invest time and resources in.

Not surprisingly, each of these commitments is lived out in the context of relationships with others.

What’s Good for Me?

As I suggested earlier, our “good life” will likely be a combination of what is true for all humans generally, even universally, and what constitutes well-being for you and me uniquely. For most of us, the good life will include both the universal and the personal.

My sister and her husband love wine. Not just the drinking of it, but everything about it. A decade ago, they bought 30 tillable acres in an area known for wine making and moved out of a large metropolitan area. My sister went back to school to get a graduate degree in viticulture. They are immersed in understanding the soil. They have planted a vineyard from the smallest rootstalks and vine starters. They tend the vineyard. They harvest, crush, and blend the grape juice. They pay attention to the chemistry as the wine ferments and takes on taste and character. They bottle and now sell multiple varieties of wine. Ultimately, they have found a meaningful vocation, built a deeper marriage partnership, and are engaged in a local community where they enjoy all aspects of making and sharing wine with others.

I Do Not Like the Taste of Wine.

The long story made short here is that while our good lives will have some general principles in common, the specifics of how we experience those common elements may vary greatly based on our unique gifts, tastes and preferences. As they say in France, a home of great wines, “viva la difference!”

One lesson I’ve learned (and relearned) is that my good life is going to be unique to me. As much as I can learn from others, it is a mistake to simply copy or mimic what has specifically worked for someone else. I don’t want to grow a vineyard and make wine! But I’m happy for my sister that she does. When you define your “good life,” include a healthy sense of flexibility. And be willing to try new things.

I don’t think we ever stop learning about the world and ourselves. And this means our understanding of our “good life” is never final.

In his TED Talk, Shankar Vedantam, host of the podcast Hidden Brain, presented findings from psychologists suggesting that our present-day self may not know what our future self will really want when we get there. We have ideas. But they are influenced by our circumstances and what we have experienced in life – only so far! Vedantam says, “I call this the illusion of continuity. And I think one reason this happens is that when we look backwards, the contrast with our prior selves to who we are today is so clear. We can see it so clearly that we have become different people. When we look forward, we can imagine ourselves being a little older, a little grayer, but we don’t imagine, fundamentally, that we’re going to have a different outlook or perspective, that we’re going to be different people.”

Being aware of the illusion of continuity empowers you to do two things when planning for your “good life”.

First, you can build in flexibility. Without flexibility, we may have regrets later when we are unable to try new things or change course a bit. Kim and I discovered that with our children and grandchildren living out of town, we didn’t want to downsize our home. Instead, we wanted something bigger and more welcoming for family and friends to stay with us, a place of hospitality as well as our own enjoyment.

Second, it’s important to stay curious and try new things. At age sixty-two, I’ve created some deeply ingrained habits that can become ruts that are hard to escape from. Through purposeful curiosity and trying new things, I may find some elements of my “good life” that I would have missed by prematurely shutting off exploration.

My good life today includes reading, writing, advising, and teaching. I want to enjoy cycling, golf, playing music, and traveling with Kim, my wife of 40 years. I want to help my children and grandchildren have interesting experiences together. I want to participate in a community of friends and faith at our local church, serving others. And I want to be generous towards those in my community who need basic living assistance including food, shelter, and education.

It’s taken years, but that simple paragraph is the closest I’ve been able to get to a statement of my commitments to vocation, marriage, religion, and community for as many years as I have left. I’m also confident that it will not be my final draft.

So back to the Original Question. What is Your “Good Life?”

Don’t be distracted by the specifics of someone else’s definition. Include what you know today about the well-being of people in general. Understand your unique circumstances and preferences. Think about what your good life will consist of from this day forward. Write it down.

And remember. It’s not a final draft.

PLEASE SEE IMPORTANT DISCLOSURE INFORMATION at www.fostergrp.com/disclosures. A copy of our written disclosure Brochure as set forth on Part 2A of Form ADV is available at www.adviserinfo.sec.gov.