You’ve probably heard that your brain starts to shrink as you get older, and that it gets harder to learn new skills and absorb new information. It is true that certain human brain parts stop developing in our mid 20s. However, (as discussed in a previous blog entry) medical scientists are now saying that in many respects, a middle-aged brain can work much better than a younger one.
With age comes wisdom. Life experience gives us the smarts to quickly size up a situation and figure out a way to fix it. Our vocabulary becomes broader as we age. We become better at judging people and their motives.
If you have taken measures to keep your brain healthy, such as partaking in brain fitness, chances are your brain has become a more finely honed instrument over the years, and is more skilled at performing certain tasks than when you were younger.
Now a new study out of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that you are not only wiser than your younger self, but likely happier too. The study entitled A snapshot of the age distribution of psychological well-being in the United States examined a 2008 Gallup phone survey of more than 340,000 people who live in the United States. After reviewing the survey data, the author () concluded that people were generally most happy with their lives in their younger and older years, with a dip in mid-life.
One theory regarding why we get happier as we age is that we stop worrying so much about the future and begin appreciating what we currently have. There is a lot to be said about enjoying the present, but this pleasure often alludes those that worry about things to come. When we begin to respect that life has an expiration date, we also start to respect and enjoy what is happening now with a new appreciation. We begin to forgive negative past experiences and relish in the positive ones.
Many people still hold on to the fallacy that the years we spent in college were our happiest moments and the period of life where we operated at our mental peak. We have been somewhat conditioned to think that “those were the days” and “an old dog can’t learn new tricks”. On the contrary, the latest research is challenging these old dictums and broadcasting a new mantra which many of us already believe, and that is our best years are yet to come!