Or is it???????

According to the research by Heather Lacey, a postdoctoral fellow and member of the U-M Medical School's Center for Behavioral and Decision Sciences in Medicine this is a common misconception shared by both the young and the old alike. Dr Heather says

Overall, people got it wrong, believing that most people become less happy as they age, when in fact this study and others have shown that people tend to become happier over time. Not only do younger people believe that older people are less happy, but older people believe they and others must have been happier 'back then'. Neither belief is accurate.

Happiness is, of course, a completely subjective experience and it is not limited to the young or the healthly. As challenging as it might seem, that beautiful young thing (of either gender) is probably not as happy as you are. What's more, some of the sickest people in our society, suffering from terminal illnesses are some of the happiest. Dr Heather says:

People often believe that happiness is a matter of circumstance, that if something good happens, they will experience long-lasting happiness, or if something bad happens, they will experience long-term misery but instead, people's happiness results more from their underlying emotional resources -- resources that appear to grow with age. People get better at managing life's ups and downs, and the result is that as they age, they become happier -- even though their objective circumstances, such as their health, decline.

Yes, the grass in the young paddock is definitely greener but the price you pay for grazing there is happiness. Fortunately, for the older sections of the community there is no choice. They are forced to choose happiness over youth which, perhaps, is not such a bad thing.

Read more here.