30 Lessons for Living: The Backstory

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Over the past year since the publication of my book 30 Lessons for Living: Tried and True Advice from the Wisest Americans, I have been gratified and touched by how much interest there is in harnessing the power of elder wisdom to improve our daily lives. People have asked for more details about the book and where the idea came from.

So I’m pleased to share an interview I conducted with the terrific ideas blog Farnam Street. It was a great opportunity to share some of the thinking that went behind the book, as well as my favorite lessons for living from the 1200 elders.

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INTERVIEWER

Can you tell me about yourself? This was a fascinating project, how did this project come about?

PILLEMER

As a gerontologist – someone who studies older people – I realized that I had focused much of my research over the past 25 years on problems of aging: nursing homes, Alzheimer’s disease, elder abuse. And that’s how our society also often looks at old people: as frail, needy, and about to bust our federal budget. But in my work, I kept meeting older people – many of whom had lost loved ones, been through tremendous difficulties, and had serious health problems – but who nevertheless were happy, fulfilled, and deeply enjoying life. I found myself asking: “What’s that all about?”

And I started seeing some fascinating research in the field of positive psychology. Study after study has shown that older people – in their 70s, 80s, and beyond – are actually happier than younger people.

One day it hit me: Maybe older people know things that younger people don’t about living a happy, healthy, fulfilling life. To my surprise I found that no one had actually done a study to answer the question: What practical advice do older people have for the younger generation? That set me off on a quest for knowledge – for the practical wisdom of older people – that lasted seven years.

So two of the main reasons for doing the project are these:

First, the fundamental hypothesis of this project and the book is that older people are the most credible experts we have on how to live happy and fulfilled lives during hard times. They have experienced extraordinarily historical events that tested their limits – and they have learned how to cope with them, to survive and to thrive. They have also been through the kinds of personal challenges and tragedies that younger people lie awake at night worrying about: loss of parents and spouses, even children; the ups and downs of marriage, child-rearing problems, bad jobs and unemployment. And they have come through them, and often are happier than younger people, as research shows us. What better source of advice for living for the rest of us?

Second, it was absolutely urgent to do a project like this now. Because this precious resource – the wisdom for living from this greatest generation – is about to disappear. In 10 years, most of this extraordinary generation – who lived through poverty in the Depression, who fought or held families together in WW II – will almost all be gone. And their advice for living would be lost forever.

That’s what I was able to capture in the Legacy Project: Not clichés or platitudes – like you see in some self-help books – but real, practical advice and tips for living better, on things like how to find a mate and stay happily married, how to raise kids, how to find a great job and succeed at it, how to avoid regrets, and how to age successfully. I wanted to take it and make it easy and fun to read for younger people – and older as well.

INTERVIEWER

You interviewed a diverse group of over 1,000 seniors. A group you call “the experts” because they’ve done something we haven’t, that is, they’ve lived a long life. What is the most important lesson they want to pass along to the young?

PILLEMER

At the core of their lessons for younger people is one major insight. And this lesson is a key to understanding their other lessons. It’s a beautiful example, because it shows something older people uniquely know – because of where they stand on life’s road – but that younger people can benefit from.

This lesson is one that almost everyone expressed. And they did it vehemently. It is kind of like one of those nightmares where you are yelling and no one can hear you. What they want younger people to know is this: life is short. The older the respondent, the more likely to say that life passes by in what seems like an instant.

They say this not to depress younger people, but to get them to be more aware and selective about how they use their time. Older people practice what psychologists call ‘socioemotional selectivity” – because their time is limited, they make careful decisions about how to use their time. The discovery of the Legacy Project is that younger people can learn from this and practice it earlier in life. As one man told me: “I wish I’d learned this in my 30s instead of in my 60s; I would have had so much more time to enjoy life.”

So they tell young people to stop wasting time and instead to use it more carefully. Some implications of this insight are to say things now to people you care about, whether it is expressing gratitude, asking forgiveness, or getting information; spending the maximum amount of time with children; and savoring daily pleasures instead of waiting for “big-ticket items” to make you happy.

Another piece of advice comes from this idea that life is much shorter than you realize: Take a chance. People in their 70s, 80s, 90s and beyond endorse taking risks when you’re young, contrary to a stereotype that elders are conservative. Their message to young people starting out is “Go for it!” They say that you are much more likely to regret what you didn’t do than what you did. As one 80-year old, successful entrepreneur told me: ‘Unless you have a compelling reason to say no, always say yes to opportunities.”

INTERVIEWER

One of the things I took away from the book is that a lot of the people you interviewed believed that happiness is a choice, that we can just choose to be happy. Some people are skeptical of the claim happiness is a choice. Can you elaborate on that?

PILLEMER

One of my first interviewees made me aware of this core piece of elder wisdom. I asked her to help me to understand the sources of her happiness. She thought for a moment and then offered the explanation that could serve as a motto for the elders: “In my 89 years, I’ve learned that happiness is a choice – not a condition.”

Most of the elders said that taking charge of one’s own happiness simply must happen at some point if one is going to live a fulfilling life, and especially in old age. Not trying to assume control over everything that happens to us – they laughed at that idea – but over our own conscious attitude toward happiness.

Another elder told me: “My single best piece of advice is to take responsibility for your own happiness throughout your life.”

The elders make the key distinction between events that happen to us on the one hand, and our internal attitude toward happiness on the other. Happy in spite of. Happiness is not a passive condition dependent on external events, nor is it the result of our personalities – just being born a happy person. Instead, happiness requires a conscious shift in outlook, in which one chooses – daily – optimism over pessimism, hope over despair.

Another of the elders described this idea as a revelation to her: “The biggest light bulb over my head came to me when I saw I could move away from painful situations by using my choices. I didn’t have to stay and take the pain. I could initiate change. This was a turning point in my life.”

You can choose to be happy, the Experts tell us, in spite of financial hardship, illness and loss. And it’s not an empty cliché, because so many are doing it right now.

INTERVIEWER

What do the experts say is most important for a long and happy marriage?

PILLEMER

Their number one lesson is: Choose your mate carefully! The key is not to rush the decision, taking all the time needed to get to know the prospective partner and to determine your compatibility with them. Said one respondent: “Don’t rush in without knowing each other deeply. That’s very dangerous, but people do it all the time.” Also make sure you like his or her family.

INTERVIEWER

One of the tips was to work in a job you love. They were essentially saying life is short, choose a job for intrinsic not monetary rewards. Can you expand on that and maybe touch on any tips they had on making the best of a bad job?

PILLEMER

The elders are unanimous on that one point: Choose a career for its intrinsic value rather than how much money you will make. Our elders are keenly aware of how short life is, and they think it’s a mistake to waste precious lifetime in work you don’t like. They tell you to avoid statements like: ‘I’d really love to do ___, but I think I can make more money doing ___.’ According to our elders, you need to be able to get up on the morning excited about work, so choose your career with that in mind.

And it’s true that the older generation has this advice for work: Make the most of a bad job. Remember that many of these folks who grew up in the Great Depression had bad jobs early on – in fact, their bad jobs make our bad jobs look like good jobs! They found, however, that they learned invaluable lessons from these less-than-ideal work situations. You can learn how the industry works, about communicating with other employees, about customer service. As one man told me: ‘You can even learn from a bad boss – how not to be a bad boss!’ All this is useful in your future career.

I would add that when asked about what makes a job truly rewarding, the oldest Americans stress autonomy. They suggest that you look for a job that offers you as much self-direction as possible – and that taking a lower salary for a job that offers you greater freedom is worth it. An 82-year old successful entrepreneur told me: “The autonomy – most people never understand that. They’re slaves to somebody. The feeling that when you have this freedom –– there’s no money that can pay for it. You can’t buy it. You have to earn it, you have to feel it, and you know something? It doesn’t get better!’”

INTERVIEWER

What were their biggest regrets?

PILLEMER

When asked what they regret in life, many of the oldest Americans said: ‘I wish I’d traveled more.’ They recommend that people embrace travel, and especially when they are young. So if young people right now are wondering what to do with those graduation gifts, elder wisdom says to look into some travel (and low budget is fine) before you begin that first job.

Another of their biggest regrets made a real impression on me. I need to admit that I’m a world-class worrier. So for me a particularly striking lesson for avoiding regret – and a nearly unanimous one – was this: Stop worrying. The elders deeply regret time wasted worrying about things that never happened. So looking back from the end of life, they take a radical view of worry. As one elder told me: “Worry wastes your life.” In the book, I give readers specific tips offered by the elders for breaking the worry habit – and they work!

INTERVIEWER

What’s changed in your life — what do you do differently now — after writing this book?

PILLEMER

I can genuinely say that the six years I spent talking to older people all over the country about their lessons for living changed my own life. I have tried to put into practice what they told me as much as I can. One thing just about every elder advises is this: “Live like your life is short.” That’s one thing they know from the vantage point at the end of the life course. They say this not to depress us, but to help us make better decisions, to savor daily life, and to say things to people that need to be said (while they are still around). I have developed more of a “carpe diem” mentality since doing this project, and I think people who read the book will too.

Probably the most extraordinary thing I learned was this: Old age is much better than we think it will be. For a lot of people who read the book, I think they will wind up being a lot less fearful about the last third of life, and much more optimistic. As one person told me: “My advice about growing old? I’d tell them to find the magic.” Despite their problems, most of the people I interviewed feel that they are happier in some ways, freer, clearer in their priorities than they were when they were younger.

If anything comes out of this book, I hope it’s this: Making people aware of the source of wisdom that’s right in front of them: America’s elders. We’re going through economic upheavals and families are struggling: Who better to ask than people who survived the Great Depression? Families are struggling with our military involvements: Why not ask people who supported families through World War II? Struggling in your marriage? Why not ask people who have been happily married for 50 or 60 years? I’d love to see these kinds of conversations going on in every family – how about starting with family holidays like Thanksgiving?

A Young Person's Dilemma: Readers, Can You Advise Him?

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At the Legacy Project, we sometimes receive questions from readers seeking wisdom about decisions they are making. Often, they are trying to apply the advice from the book 30 Lessons for Living: Tried and True Advice from the Wisest Americans to their own lives. But of course, that book can’t deal with every specific situation, and sometimes we take their questions to you, our readers – and you have always come through!

Do you have any advice for this student who is making a difficult career choice? Please let him know your thoughts by leaving a comment.

Dear Legacy Project:

First off all, thank you for your book “30 Lessons for Living.”  It has helped me out as a 22 year old! If you do not mind, I have a question regarding that topic and would greatly appreciate a response!

I am curious as to one of the lessons in the book: choosing a career for intrinsic rather than financial rewards. I totally agree. However, I am in a dilemma. I am thinking of pursuing a field which many people around me (family, some friends) consider to be “not worth it” due to job outsourcing of industrial jobs, instability of job market (for example, lay-offs in the industry I would be working in), and rather low pay. Simply googling the field I’m considering will bring up many discouraging, negative posts talking about how it is not worth it and is a bad decision for both academia and industry!

 My reasons for pursuing that field are simply that I love it very much. The passion is there. Do you believe that the experts would still persuade me to follow such a path given the risks? Or would they say that one can develop new passions?

A career advice you do not mind giving me would be very greatly appreciated!

Okay readers: You thoughts?

A List for Living – From a "Notorious Old Geezer"

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George, 81, wrote his lessons in a letter that combine good sense and humor with being a bit “on the edge.” Good advice from a self-described “notorious old geezer!”

Being a notorious old geezer myself, I decided to pass along these life lessons that I have learned:

 1, Never build a house in a flood plain.

 2. Anytime you’re offered a free lunch, turn it down. Chances are it’s someone selling time shares or rare coins.

 3. Live BENEATH your income. And sock the surplus into conservative, interesting-paying investments.

 4. Avoid all state and national lotteries. They’re a tax on the stupid.

 5. Don’t smoke; it’s the No. 1 cause of shortened lives and aging morbidity.

 6. Use credit cards and enjoy the 25-day float, but pay off the balances every month.

7. Exercise daily and vigorously (tennis is my passion).

8. Eat well, but sensibly, and maintain your normal weight.

9. Enjoy wide-ranging activities — books, concerts, plays, movies, sports, etc. They stimulate your mental, physical, and emotional powers.

10. Develop the art of critical thinking. Untested theories are just that — unproved theories.

11, And don’t give advice to people who don’t ask for it. And even if they do, be wary. Most people don’t want your opinion, just confirmation of their own prejudices.

Elder Wisdom from Tennessee! Great Advice for Living

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One of the joys of working on the Legacy Project is learning about similar ideas from around the country. This week, I received an email from Tina Jones, who runs the Spring Street Outreach Program at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Franklin, Tennessee  (pictured at right). Assisted by volunteers, Tina brings a group of around 40 low-income elders to the church each month for a hot meal and activities. All of these elders are African-Americans who lived through segregation, integration of the schools and many other significant events in our country’s history.

Tina had the great idea to have the participants offer their “Words of Wisdom” for young people. They created a lovely compilation of lessons from these wise ones, which you can read here. And the project was intergenerational: A group of students at Battle Ground Academy (a middle school in Franklin) helped summarize and present the elders’ advice. 

Here’s a sampling of the advice from several participants:

From Sheila:

People who hide nothing have nothing to hide!

To hate or be angry with someone is like you drinking poison and

wishing that the other person dies.

If you settle for what you got, then you deserve what you have!

Unsolicited advice is nothing more than criticism.

From Thelma:

Get the best education you can; everyone needs to be able to read and write well.

Leave all the bad habits alone (drugs, alcohol, crime, etc.). because they will hurt you later.

Get a job and go to work. It may not be the job you really want; but, if you work hard and people see you are a good worker, you will move ahead and things will get better.

Go to vote in every election. Get into politics to make a better world.

If there is a “black sheep” in the family, remember that his wool is just as important as the others.

From Henry:

Love one another

Learn how to pray

Stay and finish school

Follow your dreams

In the Legacy Project and the book 30 Lessons for Living, we strongly urge everyone to ask the elders in their lives for their lessons for living – before they are gone. Hats off to Tina and the St. John’s Episcopal Church outreach program for this terrific project idea. Why not try sponsoring something like it through your faith community?

The Secrets of Communicating with Adult Children

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A note to readers: For more information on this topic, please see my new book, Fault Lines: Fractured Families and How to Mend Them.

Many of the elders had one piece of advice about getting along with one’s adult children: Don’t interfere in their lives, and wait for them to come to you for advice. But what when they do ask your opinion, what are some good ways to communicate?

Tom, 82, has warm and supportive relationships with his three middle-aged sons. He recognizes that sometimes one is called upon to give advice to adult children; indeed, they ask for it. A problem, of course, is that parents are naturally invested in their children, and it is difficult for them to step outside of their own needs to objectively evaluate the choices their child must make.

Tom’s advice: Take the “I” out of the conversation:

Yeah, the big advice is always be open minded. Forget the business of ‘I’ centered and put the focus on ‘you’ centered. The son that you’re talking to and who has issues that he wants to discuss and forget the ‘I’, or at least put the I in the background so that at least he understands that he’s getting the benefit of your wisdom. You, who can govern how much ‘I’ to project, can inject information or guidance when it’s appropriate, not to dominate the conversation but to augment what the son wants to say. I think it’s a delicate balance of diplomacy among family members. I’ve not always done well.

Grace, 75, found that her enjoyment of her children increased as they grew older and became adults; it was the “pay-off” for more difficult earlier years.

I think by the time my kids were a little bit older and they were able to accept their parents for who they were, as I was with my mother, then it was great. I have enjoyed my children as adults so much, so, so much, and it’s something no one ever said to me. They always would say when the kids were young, “Oh, these are the wonderful years, these are the best years.” They were lovely years, but there is something just as lovely or more lovely when they are adults and you could talk to them as another human being. To know your children as adults is great.

She shares her thoughts with her kids, but accepts that her advice may be turned aside.

Well, there again, I think – don’t be too critical. In fact, don’t be critical at all. Accept them, accept what they’re doing. But I for example just wrote my daughter giving her some financial advice, and said, “I’m giving this to you with love not with criticism,” because she just does such stupid things financially. So – and she will read it, and maybe she’ll do it and maybe she won’t, but I’m perfectly willing to accept it that way.

Advice to Graduates – From a Pretty Cool 91-Year Old

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Here in my college town, the campus is bustling with end-of-semester activities and preparations for graduation. Who better to give advice to graduates than the oldest and wisest Americans?

Verna, 91, wrote this “list for living” for young people starting out in life. It’s a good one to pass on to the graduates this month!

1. So many things in the world have changed since the time of my grandparents and parents and the earlier times of my own life, and I know that there will be lots of changes in your lifetime too.

2. I hope you will always take education seriously (I was a teacher) and become well-educated to be ready for whatever kind of work or service you will be doing.

3. I hope that you will respect your body- take good care of it and try to have good health.

4. I hope that the governments of the world will do a better job of getting along with each other so that you can experience peace among nations.

5. I hope you will be a positive thinker, not negative or cynical.

6. Look for the good in people and things, and fill your life with love, kindness, and thoughtfulness for others.

7. I would hope that you will know the peace and joy and courage that come from following a life of love and service- the peace that passes all understanding.

8. Your real success in life lies is the kind of person you become, not with how famous or wealthy you are, so my most sincere wish is for you to live the wholesome life that will lead you to make good choices along the way, to Reach That Star that you are striving to reach.

YOU CAN DO IT!

Faith – and Poetry – at the End of Life

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Peggy, 89,  found her religious faith to be an enormous help when her husband, Larry, died suddenly several years ago. And she found release for her sorrow in writing poetry.

Peggy and Larry deeply loved one another and shared many interests and an intense closeness for over 60 years of marriage. For Peggy, her spiritual beliefs were intertwined with themarriage: “Well the basis for my understanding about what marriage is about is my faith, the idea of God before others and others before you. My faith has supported me constantly. Knowing and learning the hymns and reading the bible, all these times. There’s always something that comes to mind so you know that the spirit is leading you.”

I met Larry when I was fifteen and he was twenty. He had just been invited to come to our church by my cousin. And we had a Halloween party and I was dressed like a colonial maiden and he was dressed like a French gentleman. After the party he went to my cousin and said, “That’s the girl I’m going to marry.”

They were married for a year and a half when Larry enlisted in the Marine Corps and went to fight in World War II. They stuck together “through the ups and downs” of a long married life, running a business and raising four children. In his eighties, Larry developed a series of health problems but remained mentally intact. So Peggy was not prepared for what happened one day:

He sat there late one morning  and I had gotten him to do the crossword puzzles which I’d done for years, and I got him involved with them. And he was doing the crossword puzzle, had his breakfast, then went over and sat on the couch and he said, “Peggy,would you come here and rub my back?”  And so I went over and rubbed his back and he said, “Oh that was fine that’s enough.”  And I went back, walked back right here, and I heard two loud sighs, and he was gone.

The loss was devastating, but Peggy adjusted.” In the end I thought it was a blessing, that Larry didn’t suffer. He didn’t want to go to a nursing home. And he would say, ‘Peggy, don’t you ever die before me or I’ll kill you.’

How does one cope with the loss of a partner after a life that began at a magical costume party and lasted over six decades? For Peggy, it is her deep religious faith. A poet, she used her writing to convey the experience.

Larry and I both decided to donate our bodies to the university here. Larry’s body was sent there and we’d have the ashes. When we went for the ashes, which they only had Larry’s body for about a month, sometimes they have them for three years. The doctor told me that they used his body for a very special lesson, so I was happy.

We took the ashes and we went to a park which has a place where Roy and I used to stop called Poet’s Garden and he was a poet and I was a poet. So I sat I wrote this in the garden of poets:

I’m thinking of you constantly as through the days I go

Aware of love eternal this I surely know,

That mingling with the wildflowers  the ashes that are you

Are waiting for the time that I will be there too.

The May apple, the umbrella that shields you from the rain

The scent of valley lilies softens any pain,

Waiting for our union which indeed will come,

When the Father of the Universe sees fit to call me home.

More Advice about Overcoming Worry: From our Readers!

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In a recent blog on the Huffington Post, I wrote about the most surprising regret we heard from the older people in the Legacy Project. Over and over, the elders told us: “I wish I hadn’t worried so much,” and “Worry wastes your life.”

Over a hundred readers provided their thoughts about worry and how they have overcome the worrying habit. Here are some of my favorite pieces of advice from folks all around the country. Enjoy their wisdom!

I recently have found myself coming to a similar though slightly different conclusion as that involving less worrying over the span of one’s lifetime. My own determination is to try and go through life with as few regrets as possible because what has happened is already done and over with and more often that not, these things are irreversible and and can not be redone or their outcomes changed. Just try not to make the same mistakes for things that did not quite work out like you wanted them to or which you might have done differently in hindsight. What’s done is done, for good or for bad. Try to focus your life on the here and now and on the – hopefully – brighter future that looms large up ahead, by the grace of God.

 In one week in 2009, one daughter graduated law school with honors and the other graduated from a demanding high school. They are nearly seven years apart in age because my husband, in spite of being successful, was always worried about the money for their education and other needs. At the second one’s graduation, we were holding hands, and as he squeezed mine, he said, “We should have had another one. I shouldn’t have worried so much about the money.” This was a real shock to me because he has trouble admitting when he’s mistaken about something, so this was a huge thing. Very lovable!

 At a very low period in my life, I was told by a priest, “Worry is interest on problems you do not have yet.”….It has stayed with me all these years

 I am not a worrier. Sure, I’ve had some things that have bothered me, but most of the time it doesn’t cross my mind. When worry does hit me, I jump on it to get rid of it. Not only is it a waste of time, but it poisons relationships, ruins your enjoyment of activities, and affects health.

 I found one really interesting thing about not being a worrier. Other people, suspected me of being uncaring. They worried about their teens. I didn’t. I did everything I could to make sure they were safe and following the rules, and then I enjoyed them. There were other moms who questioned if I loved them because, to them, love and worry were inseparable. Not only is that false, not worrying leads to better relationships with your kids, as far as I can tell.

I have a child with a terminal illness, although he has been defying the odds. On top of that I have developed some sort of auto immune disorder that robs me of my hearing, as the “breadwinner” in our family you can imagine the stress this has caused. There was a low point where I thought I simply couldn’t take it anymore. You know what got me there? Worrying. Im still working, he’s still alive, we are still living a decent life. I wish you the best in your struggle with this awful habit. 

I called a friend(actually my AA sponsor) years ago to tell her about some awful, terrible life-altering problem. She asked if I remembered a call I had made several months before with another awful, terrible life-altering problem. I did not. Her response. “Well, there you go” and she hung up. Best lesson ever. If I start fretting over anything I think: Is this something that will matter in 6 months? Almost always it is a no. One instance it was raining horribly, roof was leaking and water was coming close to back kitchen door – then lightning struck my computer and I sat down to cry. Remembered that phone call, changed attitude, and it turned out fine.

I’m 65. This article is 100% right! Human mistakes of the past can be valuable in teaching us life lessons so there’s no good reason to regret them. But time wasted cannot be reclaimed and serves no useful purpose whatsoever. It’s best to “fill the unforgiving moment with 60 seconds worth of distance run”. As I look back, there are parts of my life when I sure wish I’d done that instead of worrying about something I couldn’t do anything about. Good news is that I’m not worrying now! I think I just ran my course with it.

At 35, someone told me this quote. I’m 68 now and it has never left me: “Worry is like sitting in a rocking chair. It doesn’t accomplish a damned thing. It just gives you something to do!”

We welcome more of your thoughts and strategies about worry!

Sensible Elder Lessons about Money

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Sometimes I find myself thinking: Whatever happened to good sense? When it comes to money, the elders offer advice that is, well, sensible. They came from a generation of savers, re-users, and careful consumers. Here’s 91-year old Betty’s advice for financial well-being:

You need a checking account and a savings account. Take each paycheck to the bank and deposit, don’t cash it. Hold out enough for cash purchases, groceries, etc.  Leave enough in the checking account to pay current bills. Whenever possible, put a little in the savings account. This is your emergency fund for unexpected expenses and a start toward your savings.

Be wary of credit cards. Never use one unless you can pay the bill in full at the end of the month. The interest can be devastating to your finances.

Aim toward home ownership. Rent is a constant drain with nothing to show for it.

For major purchases, save first and pay cash. This goes for cars and it can be done.  As soon as I’ve bought a car, I start saving (in the savings account) for the next. Making payments adds much more to the cost. That money can be yours to use.

When you have your finances organized and are keeping out of debt you are ready for the next step. Start your life savings. It is all right to start small but you can’t start too soon. Locate a full service brokerage firm and appointment with a financial adviser, who will listen to your needs and advise accordingly. Medium risk stock will likely serve you best. Later you can use the dividends for extra income. If you keep increasing your stock portfolio, it will provide financial security for retirement. Never buy stock from a small outfit that only deals with a limited type of stock or on advice of an individual.

Worry Wastes Your Life

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What do older people regret when they look back over their lives? I asked hundreds of the oldest Americans that question. I had expected big-ticket items: an affair, a shady business deal, addictions — that kind of thing. I was therefore unprepared for the answer they often gave:

I wish I hadn’t spent so much of my life worrying.

Over and over, as the 1,200 elders in our Legacy Project reflected on their lives, I heard versions of “I would have spent less time worrying” and “I regret that I worried so much about everything.” Indeed, from the vantage point of late life, many people felt that if given a single “do-over” in life, they would like to have all the time back they spent fretting anxiously about the future.

Their advice on this issue is devastatingly simple and direct: Worry is an enormous waste of your precious and limited lifetime. They suggested training yourself to reduce or eliminate worrying as the single most positive step you can make toward greater happiness. The elders conveyed, in urgent terms, that worry is an unnecessary barrier to joy and contentment. And it’s not just what they said — it’s how they said it.

John Alonzo, 83, is a man of few words, but I quickly learned that what he had to say went straight to the point. A construction worker, he had battled a lifetime of financial insecurity. But he didn’t think twice in giving this advice:

Don’t believe that worrying will solve or help anything. It won’t. So stop it.

That was it. His one life lesson was simply to stop worrying.

James Huang, 87, put it this way:

Why? I ask myself. What possible difference did it make that I kept my mind on every little thing that might go wrong? When I realized that it made no difference at all, I experienced a freedom that’s hard to describe. My life lesson is this: Turn yourself from frittering away the day worrying about what comes next and let everything else that you love and enjoy move in.

This surprised me. Indeed, I thought that older people would endorse a certain level of worry. It seemed reasonable that people who had experienced the Great Depression would want to encourage financial worries; who fought or lost relatives in World War II would suggest we worry about international issues; and who currently deal with increasing health problems would want us to worry about our health.

The reverse is the case, however. The elders see worry as a crippling feature of our daily existence and suggest that we do everything in our power to change it. Why is excessive worry such a big regret? Because, according to the elders, worry wastes your very limited and precious lifetime. By poisoning the present moment, they told me, you lose days, months, or years that you can never recover.

Betty, 76, expressed this point with a succinct example:

I was working, and we learned that there were going to be layoffs in my company in three months. I did nothing with that time besides worry. I poisoned my life by worrying obsessively, even though I had no control over what would happen. Well — I wish I had those three months back.

 Life is simply too short, the oldest Americans tell us, to spend it torturing yourself over outcomes that may never come to pass.

How should we use this lesson, so that we don’t wind up at the end of our lives longing to get back the time we wasted worrying? The elders fortunately provide us with some concrete ways of thinking differently about worry and moving beyond it as we go through our daily lives.

Tip 1: Focus on the short term rather than the long term.

Eleanor is a delightful, positive 102-year-old who has had much to worry about in her long life. Her advice is to avoid the long view when you are consumed with worry and to focus instead on the day at hand. She told me:

Well, I think that if you worry, and you worry a lot, you have to stop and think to yourself, “This too will pass.” You just can’t go on worrying all the time because it destroys you and life, really. But there’s all the times when you think of worrying and you can’t help it — then just make yourself stop and think: it doesn’t do you any good. You have to put it out of your mind as much as you can at the time. You just have to take one day at a time. It’s a good idea to plan ahead if possible, but you can’t always do that because things don’t always happen the way you were hoping they would happen. So the most important thing is one day at a time.

Tip 2: Instead of worrying, prepare.

The elders see a distinct difference between worry and conscious, rational planning, which greatly reduces worry. It’s the free-floating worry, after one has done everything one can about a problem, which seems so wasteful to them.

Joshua Bateman, 74, summed up the consensus view:

If you’re going to be afraid of something, you really ought to know what it is. At least understand why. Identify it. ‘I’m afraid of X.’ And sometimes you might have good reason. That’s a legitimate concern. And you can plan for it instead of worrying about it.

Tip 3: Acceptance is an antidote to worry

The elders have been through the entire process many times: worrying about an event, having the event occur and experiencing the aftermath. Based on this experience, they recommend an attitude of acceptance as a solution to the problem of worry. However, we tend to see acceptance as purely passive, not something we can actively foster. In addition to focusing on the day at hand and being prepared as cures for worry, many of the elders also recommend actively working toward acceptance. Indeed this was most often the message of the oldest experts.

Sister Clare, a 99-year-old nun, shared a technique for reducing worry through pursuing acceptance:

There was a priest that said mass for us, and at a certain time of his life, something happened, and it broke his heart. And he was very angry — he just couldn’t be resigned, he couldn’t get his mind off it. Just couldn’t see why it had happened.So he went to an elderly priest and said, “What shall I do? I can’t get rid of it.” And the priest said, “Every time it comes to your mind, say this.” And the priest said very slowly, “Just let it be, let it be.” And this priest told us, “I tried that and at first it didn’t make any difference, but I kept on. After a while, when I pushed it aside, let it be, it went away. Maybe not entirely, but it was the answer.”

 Sister Clare, one of the most serene people I have ever met, has used this technique for well over three-quarters of a century.

So many things come to your mind. Now, for instance, somebody might hurt your feelings. You’re going to get back at him or her — well, just let it be. Push it away. So I started doing that. I found it the most wonderful thing because everybody has uncharitable thoughts, you can’t help it. Some people get on your nerves and that will be there until you die. But when they start and I find myself thinking, “Well, now, she shouldn’t do that. I should tell her that . . .” Let it be. Often, before I say anything, I think, “If I did that, then what?” And let it be. Oh, so many times I felt grateful that I did nothing. That lesson has helped me an awful lot.

Worry is endemic to the experience of most modern-day human beings, so much so that following this piece of elder wisdom may seem impossible to some of you. But what the elders tell us is consistent with research findings. The key characteristic of worry, according to scientists who study it, is that it takes place in the absence of actual stressors; that is, we worry when there is actually nothing concrete to worry about. This kind of worry — ruminating about possible bad things that may happen to us or our loved ones — is entirely different from concrete problem solving. When we worry, we are dwelling on possible threats to ourselves rather than simply using our cognitive resources to figure a way out of a difficult situation.

A critically important strategy for regret reduction, according to our elders, is increasing the time spent on concrete problem solving and drastically eliminating time spent worrying. One activity enhances life, whereas down the road the other is deeply regretted as a waste of our all-too-short time on Earth.