DR ROBERT WALDINGER: This Is How You Make 2026 The Happiest Year of Your Life
Great Company with Jamie Laing
Jampot
4.6 • 951 Ratings
🗓️ 7 January 2026
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
We all want to be happy and live a good life but how do we actually get there? It’s a big question, and one that most of us don’t have a clear answer to. This episode will help you find your happiest self.
In fact, we’re often told that money, status and success are the keys to happiness. But according to professor and psychiatrist Dr Robert Waldinger, we’ve been getting it wrong.
Dr Waldinger is the director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, the longest-running study on happiness ever conducted. I was so excited to sit down with him to discuss what more than 85 years of research reveals about living a good life and how we can all make this year the happiest year of our lives - starting now.
We cover:
- What really matters for long-term happiness
- How to live a happy life
- Why loneliness is one of the biggest threats to our wellbeing
- What we get wrong about happiness and how to get it right
- The most common unhealthy traits in our relationships
- Simple ways to meet people and make meaningful connections
This conversation will leave you feeling hopeful and give you a renewed appreciation for the people in your life.
Dr Robert Waldinger is Great Company.
Learn more about Dr Waldinger's book 'The Good Life ' HERE
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THE CREDITS
Executive Producers: Ewan Newbigging-Lister & Jemima Rathbone
Producer: Helen Burke
Assistant Producer: Issy Weeks-Hankins
Video: Jake Ji & Ryley Kirby
Social Media: Laura Coughlan & Anthony Barter
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Coming up in this episode of Great Company. |
| 0:02.7 | Okay, if we started a fresh tomorrow and made happiness our number one priority, what are the key things we should be focusing on? |
| 0:09.1 | I mean, I'm going to give you the simplest answer. I would say it. |
| 0:14.0 | Hi, I'm Bob Waldinger, and I'm in great company. |
| 0:17.2 | Dr. Robert Waldinger. |
| 0:18.7 | Director of the world's longest running study of happiness. |
| 0:22.5 | I'm the fourth director of the longest study of human life that's ever been done. It started in |
| 0:28.3 | the year 1938 with 724 teenagers now in our 87th year. We want to know what helps people thrive. What are the predictors of who's going to be happy and healthy as they go through their lives? That just hadn't been done. What did the results show in the end? They showed two big things. The culture gives us this message, oh, if you get really rich, then you're going to be happy. And it's not true. |
| 0:55.1 | Is loneliness dangerous for us? What is stress doing to the brain? Are we meant to be in |
| 0:58.2 | relationships with one person? What makes a good life? What is it? Oh, just a little question. |
| 1:04.7 | There's research that showed that staying in a really terrible relationship is literally |
| 1:09.4 | worse for your help. Deplete your health. Yeah, oh yeah. We studied these people their whole lives. And when they got to be in their 80s, we asked them, looking back on your life, what are you proud of stuff? Nobody mentioned their accomplishments. Get out of it. Everybody. They talked about their relationships with people. They said, you know, I was a good partner. |
| 1:29.2 | I was a good dad. |
| 1:31.1 | Why do you think that is? |
| 1:35.5 | Hello, everyone. |
| 1:36.7 | My name is Jamie Lang, and this is Great Company. |
| 1:42.8 | Your TED Talk has 28 million views. |
| 1:45.1 | 51 million. |
| 1:46.3 | Sorry, my mistake. |
| 1:48.7 | Who's counting over here? |
| 1:50.1 | Not really, who's counting? |
| 1:51.4 | It's like, I'm so embarrassed that I even know that number, |
... |
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