So there are two studies, one commissioned by Weetabix, one by the UN, but we don’t need to decide which one is likely to be the more reliable because, praise be, they both say the same thing: 45 is now the age of peak happiness. A massive 77% are more content with their lives after they hit 40, with two-thirds saying they no longer cared what other people thought, and 59% having attained self-actualisation – or, at least, they say they “now know what really matters in life”. Which is probably about as self-actualised as it gets. That data is all from the high-fibre breakfast treat funded study.
The UN, meanwhile, has survey results from the UK, Ireland, the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, and kicks off cheerfully enough – happiness used to be conceived in a U-shape, when it was bliss to be alive in youth, miserable in middle age, and then picked up again as you got older. Now it’s more of a straight upward trajectory, although that can’t literally be true as it would make babies the saddest people on Earth. Fair play, they do cry a lot.
