The #elderproject – what I learned
For the past 10 years I’ve always spent the first few quiet days of the year thinking about the past 365 days and planning for the next. This year, my introspection also turned out to be a good opportunity go through all my #elderproject interviews and gather the learnings.
My experiment succeeded and failed at the same time. It succeeded because I found answers to a number of questions I’ve been ruminating over, but it failed because I interviewed substantially less people than planned. However, I am happy with the outcome and would like to share the results with you. Here are the #elderproject questions and my summary for each question.
What makes you happy?
Three things surfaced as the main drivers for happiness: a happy family, close friends, and achieving one’s career goals. Not a single person from the ones I interviewed mentioned money as a driver for happiness. This doesn’t mean money is not important (as you will see in a question below), but it is not a prerequisite for happiness.
If you could go back in time, what would you change?
The answers to this question varied a lot and when grouping them into buckets, I discovered three different themes of “regret”: love (either not pursuing one’s true love, or not being careful enough in choosing one’s partner), education (mainly wishing they had spent more time on their education) and balance (mainly finding balance between the time spent at work vs. time with their families).
What was the most important thing for you when you were young?
No surprises here. Making money & building a career was perceived as the top priority for most of my interviewees. For a small number of people, however, the desire to build a career was only a way to achieve the level of financial stability necessary to sustain a family.
What’s the most important thing for you now?
Health, balance between work & family (or friends), and recognition from one’s peers. Dave Moore from Xaxis had one of my favourite quotes from all the interviews: “Family is very, very important in my life. To succeed in business and fail at home is to fail completely.”
Work & Family, what is more important?
Not a single person said they wish they had spent more time at work. With one exception, all of them said that work & family are equally important but that if they were to choose between them, they would choose family. Dave Moore had a wonderful quote, again: “The most important thing is to leave a family legacy so strong that generations within your family will remember you.”
How important has money been in your life?
Everyone said money is very important because it offers independence and stability. Among all the people I interviewed, I noticed a love-hate attitude towards money because they acknowledge that it can sometimes change people for the worse. My dad said: “Money is important, but not the most important. One should rather have no money if it changes his character.”
Is there a moment that has completely changed your life?
Out of the ones that could identify a seminal moment, two threads emerged: either moving to another country, or the death / illness of a close one (friend or family). No one mentioned a work-related event. Work is work and as it turns out changes in one’s career, losing their job, etc does not influence people long-term.
Have you had any role models in your life?
The biggest surprise for me was that almost all the people I spoke with said that their parents or partner were their role models. For those who named public figures, the most prevalent were heads of state or entrepreneurs.
What do you want to leave behind?
I would do this section no justice if I summarized it, so I’m just going to share some of their responses. They are all beautiful. “Leave a happy memory.” “A good name.” “Be remembered by a lot of people that I’ve done something for that they’ll never forget.” “Happiness to all my family. That’s it.” “My only modest goal is that the people around me will have good things to say about me.” “I hope they would say I was a kind person. I would like for someone to say that I really made a difference for some people. That I righted some wrongs.” As you can see, all the responses are about people. All about being kind & generous. All about family.
Do you have any fears in growing old?
Without exception, health. Elderly people are afraid, for good reason, to become physically or intellectually incapacitated. Their fear springs from a desire to be able to enjoy time with their families without being “a bloody nuisance”, as Jeff Hutchinson said.
If you could live forever but keep just one of the things you currently have, what would you want to keep (work, family, health, money)?
Family & health were winners on this front. A few people said they wouldn’t be able to make this decision and would rather not live forever than having to choose.
If I were your grandchild, what would be the once piece of advice you would give me?
Be generous, kind and respectful. Go to school, educate yourself, never stop learning. And never give up.
What’s the meaning of life?
Graham Perolls summarized the views of pretty much everyone who answered this question: “Life is a struggle. There are no easy answers. I have an anchor in my faith, and feel that we are all on this earth for a purpose, and we need to find what that purpose is.” I also really liked what Princess Marina Sturdza said: “[the meaning of life is all about] living life with a certain amount of humility. Staying humble. Finding balance.” And lastly, Ewan summarized everything, for me, on this topic, by saying “What’s the meaning of life? I don’t know – perhaps, love.”
Happy New Year and I hope you enjoyed listening to my interviews and reading this summary as much as I enjoyed making these wonderful new friends and learning from them.