April 2021
The average human life lasts 650,000 hours. How will you spend yours?
The Suberts’ Volvo had 200,000+ miles on the odometer when they drove cross-country.
Why Experiences Make
Us Happier Than Stuff
Last summer, my neighbors Marianna and Sándor Subert embarked on a cross-country road trip with an altruistic twist. After driving their 2006 Volvo S40 from Virginia to California, they ended their two-week trek by donating the car to Goodwill in San Francisco, an experience I wrote about for Travel + Leisure.
Meaningful travel will likely be a post-pandemic trend, but the Subert’s trip also revealed the power of anticipation. Researching their journey, Marianna found, was exciting — “like we were living the trip just by planning it.” This is a common reaction: Studies show we get a bigger rush waiting for an experience like a cruise or a trip to Disneyland (well, unless you hate Disney) than we do for material goods.
“Trips don’t just make us happy while we’re on them,” explains Amit Kumar, an assistant professor of Marketing and Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. “They can make us happy before we get on the plane or go on a hike or play on the beach.”
As we ponder our post-pandemic lives, here’s a suggestion. Instead of buying more stuff, spend money on a trip. Or a concert (remember those?). Or a family dinner. Paying for experiences makes us happier than buying material goods, research shows, and once we start traveling again, we’ll likely experience a “happiness reset”: Small trips that may have seemed routine before the pandemic — like a weekend trek to the beach — might feel like an exotic jaunt to Bora Bora, a New York Times piece explains.
So start planning to go somewhere even if you can’t go anywhere. The mere anticipation may boost your mood. As wise bear Winnie the Pooh once noted, the moment before you eat the honey is often better than when you do. —Ken Budd
See The World
This new national park has 53 miles of churning river. Photo Credit: VISIT SOUTHERN WV
America’s newest national park puts the gorge in gorgeous. Here’s my piece for AARP on what to do and where to stay at New River Gorge in West Virginia.
Traveling makes you happier — and you only have to go 75 miles from home, Steven Reinberg explains for U.S. News & World Report.
Plus: How the COVID vaccine might change world travel (Elise Taylor, Vogue), why travel can improve your health and creativity (Candice Gaukel Andrews, Good Nature Travel), and where to find the world’s remaining naturally quiet places (Terry Ward, National Geographic).
Live Your Best Life
Switzerland ranks high on happiest-places-to-live lists (and the views aren't bad in Bern).
Harvard professor Arthur C. Brooks offer some intriguing happiness advice in The Atlantic: Find the place you love, then move there.
Mr. Rogers would have turned 90 in March. Here’s my piece on his secrets to a happy, healthy life, from being a vegetarian to, yes, playing with puppets.
Plus: Five ways to stay upbeat when things kind of suck (Nancy Clanton, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution); why a sense of meaning may aid longevity (Marta Zaraska, The Washington Post); valuing time over money can make you happier (outsourcing household chores is like getting an $18,000 raise, writes Gili Malinsky for CNBC).
Meet Amazing People
Rich Awko remains connected to his roots in Africa.
A mobile shower truck is just one cool way that Rich Akwo’s org Generosity Global helps Baltimore’s homeless. I explore his work in Charm City and his native Cameroon in my new “Everyday Heroes” column for The Saturday Evening Post.
“We had lice. We had rats. But every day…was a miracle.” Toby Levy, an 87-year-old Holocaust survivor, reflects on losing a year to COVID-19 in a powerful essay for The New York Times.
Plus: A Michigan man was falsely imprisoned for 38 years until a woman admitted she lied about her testimony (Bill Hutchinson, ABC News); a Georgia boy started reading when he was six months old and now attends college at age 12 (Taylor Haney, NPR); a working mother of four passed the bar exam after studying for nine years (Chris Lumsden, Good Morning America).
Photo of the Month
Roughly two months before the pandemic began, I was in the village of Dagabo, Mali, observing the amazing work of One Global Village, which runs a school there and provides medical care, and United Aid Foundation, a disaster relief org that performed building work. Below are additional shots from the village.
