What Makes a Good Life? Lessons from the Longest Study on Happiness | Robert Waldinger | TED · TED
哈佛75年追踪研究揭示幸福与健康的真正来源。Robert Waldinger分享了关于如何构建充实人生的实用建议，适合练习听力与理解生活哲理。
What keeps us healthy and happy as we go through life?
是什么让我们在人生的道路上保持健康和快乐呢？
If you were going to invest now in your future best self, where would you put your time and your energy?
如果你现在要为自己的“未来最佳状态”进行投资，你会把时间和精力投入到哪里呢？
There was a recent survey of millennials
最近有一项针对千禧一代的调查。
asking them what their most important life goals were, and over 80 percent said that a major life goal for them was to get rich.
当被问及他们最重要的生活目标是什么时，超过80%的人表示，他们的主要生活目标就是发财。
And another 50 percent of those same young adults said that another major life goal was to become famous.
另外，还有 50% 的这些年轻人表示，他们的另一个重要人生目标是成名。
And we're constantly told to lean in to work, to push harder and achieve more.
我们总是被告知要更加努力地工作，要更加拼命地奋斗，以实现更多的目标。
We're given the impression that these are the things that we need to go after in order to have a good life.
给我们的印象是，这些就是我们为了过上美好生活而必须追求的目标。
Pictures of entire lives, of the choices that people make and how those choices work out for them,
这些照片记录了人们的一生，展现了他们所做的选择，以及这些选择最终给他们带来的结果。
those pictures are almost impossible to get.
那些照片几乎根本拍不到。
Most of what we know about human life we know from asking people to remember the past, and as we know,
我们对人类生活的了解，大部分来自于让人们回忆过去。正如我们所知……
hindsight is anything but 20/20.
事后看来，情况远非那么一目了然（或者说，事后对事情的理解并不总是那么准确）。
We forget vast amounts of what happens to us in life, and sometimes memory is downright creative.
我们会忘记生活中发生的许多事情；有时候，记忆本身其实也是一种“创造性的过程”（即记忆会通过我们的主观解释而发生变化）。
But what if we could watch entire lives as they unfold through time?
但如果我们能够亲眼目睹整个人生在时间中的发展过程，那会怎么样呢？
What if we could study people from the time that they were teenagers
如果我们能够研究人们从青少年时期开始的生活状况，那会怎么样呢？
all the way into old age to see what really keeps people happy and healthy?
一直活到老年，才能真正弄清楚是什么让人们保持幸福和健康的状态呢？
We did that.
我们确实做到了。
The Harvard Study of Adult Development may be the longest study of adult life that's ever been done.
哈佛大学的“成人发展研究”可能是迄今为止持续时间最长的关于成人生活的研究项目。
For 75 years, we've tracked the lives of 724 men,
75年来，我们一直追踪着724名男性的生活轨迹。
year after year, asking about their work,
年复一年地询问他们的工作情况……
their home lives, their health, and of course asking all along the way without knowing how their life stories were going to turn out.
他们的家庭生活、健康状况，当然还有在整个过程中不断向他们提问——尽管我们并不知道他们的故事最终会如何发展。
Studies like this are exceedingly rare.
像这样的研究极为罕见。
Almost all projects of this kind fall apart within a decade because too many people drop out of the study,
几乎所有这类项目都在十年内失败了，因为太多人中途退出了研究。
or funding for the research dries up, or the researchers get distracted, or they die, and nobody moves the ball further down the field.
要么研究的资金枯竭了，要么研究人员分心了，要么他们去世了，结果就没有人能够继续推进这项研究。
But through a combination of luck and the persistence of several generations of researchers, this study has survived.
但得益于运气以及几代研究人员的不懈努力，这项研究最终得以完成并得以保存下来。
About 60 of our original 724 men are still alive, still participating in the study, most of them in their 90s.
在我们最初的 724 名参与者中，目前仍有约 60 人存活，并继续参与这项研究；他们中的大多数人都已九十多岁了。
And we are now beginning to study the more than 2,000 children of these men.
我们现在开始研究这些男性的2000多名子女。
And I'm the fourth director of the study.
我是这项研究的第四位负责人（即第四任项目主任）。
Since 1938, we've tracked the lives of two groups of men.
自 1938 年以来，我们一直追踪着两组男性的生活轨迹。
The first group started in the study when they were sophomores at Harvard College.
第一组参与者在哈佛大学读大二时便开始了这项研究。
They all finished college during World War II, and then most went off to serve in the war.
他们都在第二次世界大战期间完成了大学学业，之后大多数人纷纷参军服役。
And the second group that we've followed
以及我们一直在跟踪的第二个群体
was a group of boys from Boston's
这是一群来自波士顿的男孩……
poorest neighborhoods, boys who were chosen for the study specifically because they were from some of the most troubled
最贫困的社区；这些男孩之所以被选中参与这项研究，正是因为他们来自一些问题最为严重的家庭/社区。
and disadvantaged families in the Boston of the 1930s.
以及20世纪30年代波士顿那些处于弱势地位的家庭。
Most lived in tenements, many without hot and cold running water.
大多数人住在公寓里，其中很多公寓甚至没有冷热水供应。
When they entered the study, all of these teenagers were interviewed.
当这些青少年进入研究机构时，他们都接受了访谈。
They were given medical exams.
他们接受了体检。
We went to their homes and we interviewed their parents.
我们去了他们的家中，并对他们父母进行了采访。
And then these teenagers grew up into adults who entered all walks of life.
这些青少年长大后成为了成年人，他们进入了各行各业。
They became factory workers and lawyers and bricklayers and doctors, one President of the United States.
他们有的成为了工厂工人、律师、砖匠和医生，还有一位成为了美国总统。