--- ## Highlights “I think I may have met my future wife,” I told my father on the phone, “but there are a few issues.” To be precise: I met the woman in question on a weeklong trip to Europe, she lived in Spain, we’d only been on a couple of dates, and we didn’t speak a word of the same language. Obviously, I told my amused father, “she has no idea I plan to marry her.” But I was 24 and lovestruck, and none of that stopped me from embarking on a quixotic romantic adventure. After a year punctuated by two frustratingly short visits, I quit my job in New York and moved to Barcelona with a plan to learn the language and a prayer that when she could actually understand me, she _might_ love me. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01gkwmhq6h7m26c98mzz1crts2)) The most important predictors of late-life happiness are stable relationships—and, especially, a long romantic partnership. The healthiest participants at age 80 tend to have been most satisfied in their relationships at age 50. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01gkwmb1wg57v4pktmymnmyjqm)) the secret to happiness isn’t falling in love; it’s _staying_ in love ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01gkwmbfbkddyfy0x5h6k8b6dj)) The important thing for well-being is relationship satisfaction, and that depends on what psychologists [call](https://archive.ph/o/1nwGi/https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/sbp/sbp/2004/00000032/00000002/art00007) “companionate love”—**love based less on passionate highs and lows and more on stable affection, mutual understanding, and commitment**. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01gkwmcxg913sg5hqxtgqa3xnp)) The deep friendship of companionate love should _not_ be exclusive, however. In 2007, researchers at the University of Michigan [found](https://archive.ph/o/1nwGi/https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18179331/) that married people aged 22 to 79 who said they had at least two close friends—meaning at least one besides their spouse—had higher levels of life satisfaction and self-esteem and lower levels of depression than spouses who did not have close friends outside their marriage ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01gkwmfmvdb69519hm0ns043er)) “It is not the absence of love but the absence of friendship that makes marriages unhappy.” ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01gkwmg04bmewewygezkszzq1d))