Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart: Thirty True Things You Need to Know Now

by Gordon Livingston

The good news is that we have effective treatments for the symptoms of depression; the bad news is that medication will not make you happy. Happiness is not simply the absence of despair. It is an affirmative state in which our lives have both meaning and pleasure.

Conversely, in judging other people we need to pay attention not to what they promise but to how they behave.

We demonstrate courage in the numberless small ways in which we meet our obligations or reach out to try the new things that might improve our lives.

The three components of happiness are something to do, someone to love, and something to look forward to.

We love someone when the importance of his or her needs and desires rises to the level of our own.

The point is that love is demonstrated behaviorally.

The worst deceptions, of course, are those we practice on ourselves. What we choose to believe is closely related to deeply felt needs—for example, the dream we all carry around inside us of perfect love, unqualified acceptance of the sort available only from a good mother.

The other thing that true love requires of us is the courage to become totally vulnerable to another.

Finally, we are entitled to receive only that which we are prepared to give. This is why there is truth to the adage that we all get the marriage partners we deserve, and why most of our dissatisfactions with others reflect limitations in ourselves.

The motivations and habit patterns that underlie most of our behavior are seldom logical; we are much more often driven by impulses, preconceptions, and emotions of which we are only dimly aware.