Time to let go of those hopelessly unrealistic ambitions, says Toby Young

WE HEAR a lot about the value of tenacity these days. The Department for Education has just unveiled the Character Awards, whereby schools will be given prizes for teaching traits like “resilience” and “grit”, and more than half of the eight 2015 Best Picture nominees, celebrate the American virtue of stick-to-it-ness.

But is blind persistence really such a virtue? No doubt it’s an essential prerequisite of achieving your lifelong dream, but what if you don’t achieve that dream? And, let’s face it, most of us are never going to. Is it sensible to carry on yearning to be a movie star or a best-selling novelist or an Oscar-winning screenwriter long even after it’s blindingly obvious you’re never going to make it? At some point, isn’t it reasonable to just give up and settle for what you have?

Yes, according to Andrew Oswald, a professor of economics at Warwick and one of the architects of a happiness survey involving over two million people in 72 countries. The survey revealed that happiness is U-shaped – that is, we start out happy, gradually become more and more miserable as we get older, hit rock bottom in middle-age, then begin to cheer up until, by the time we reach old age, we’re back to being happy again.

Professor Oswald believes one reason for this dip is that middle age is when most of us abandon our dreams. “We cannot all be captain of the national football team or a rock star,” he says. “The thirties and forties are therefore painful times when reality sets in.”

But the good news is, once you’ve let go of those hopelessly unrealistic ambitions, things begin to feel a lot better. “We learn to count our blessings when we get older,” he says. “We see friends and family die and we see bad things happen and are just happy to be alive.”

So there you have it. The advice of Schiller – “Keep true to the dreams of thy youth” – and Laertes – “To thine own self be true” – turns out to be terrible. By all means have a crack at greatness. Give it your best shot in your twenties and thirties – maybe even in the first half of your forties. But if you haven’t made any headway by then, stop dreaming! Past 45, giving up is the key to happiness.

ENDS

@toadmeister

www.nosacredcows.co.uk