The author in this article says that
Falling in love can be exhilarating, but it isn't the secret to happiness.
Falling in love is the start-up cost for happiness—an exhilarating but stressful stage we have to endure to get to the relationships that actually fulfill us.
Passionate love—the period of falling in love—often hijacks our brains in a way that can cause elation or the depths of despair.
He also mentions about The Harvard Study of Adult Development that has assessed the connection between people’s habits and their subsequent well-being since the late 1930s.
Their findings indicate that the happiest, healthiest people in old age never smoked or they gave up smoking early in life, they exercised, they drank moderately or not at all, and they stayed mentally active but the most important predictors of late-life happiness are stable relationships—and, especially, a long romantic partnership. The healthiest participants at age 80 tend to have been most satisfied in their relationships at age 50.
In other words, the secret to happiness isn't falling in love; it’s staying in love. This does not mean just sticking together legally: Research shows that being married only accounts for 2 percent of subjective well-being later in life. The important thing for well-being is relationship satisfaction, and that depends on what psychologists call “companionate love”—love based less on passionate highs and lows and more on stable affection, mutual understanding and commitment.
Being rooted in friendship is the reason that companionate love creates true happiness. Passionate love, which relies on attraction, does not typically last beyond the novelty of the relationship. Companionate love relies on its very familiarity. As one researcher bluntly summarizes the evidence in the Journal of Happiness Studies, “The well-being benefits of marriage are much greater for those who also regard their spouse as their best friend.”
Best friends get enjoyment, satisfaction and meaning from each other’s company. They bring out the best in one another; they gently tease one another; they have fun together. President Calvin Coolidge and his wife Grace enjoyed such a friendship. Their teasing can be seen in The Coolidge Effect.
The romance of companionate love seems to make people happiest when it’s monogamous. In 2004, a survey of 16,000 American adults found that for men and women alike, “The happiness-maximizing number of sexual partners in the previous year is calculated to be 1.”
But the deep friendship of companionate love should not be exclusive. In 2007, researchers at the University of Michigan found that married people aged 22 to 79 who said they had at least 2 close friends—meaning at least one besides their spouse—had higher levels of life satisfaction and self-esteem and lower levels of depression than spouses who did not have close friends outside their marriage. In other words, long-term companionate love might be necessary but it isn't sufficient for happiness.
Well, if you've enjoyed reading the above excerpts and would like to know more about the type of love that makes people happiest, you need to click this Link from where I've excerpted it all....
The author of this article is Arthur C. Brooks. He is Professor of the Practice of Public Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School and Professor of Management Practice at Harvard Business School. He is the author of 11 books including the national bestsellers - Love Your Enemies (2019), The Conservative Heart (2015), and The Road to Freedom (2012). He gives more than 100 speeches every year in USA, Europe and Asia. He holds a Ph.D. and an M.Phil. in Policy Analysis from the Pardee RAND Graduate School. He also holds an M.A. in Economics from Florida Atlantic University and a B.A. in Economics from Thomas Edison State College.
That's all my Sharing for now.
Happy Loving :)
Best Wishes, AC
