In the New Yorker magazine of 20 May 2013, Rebecca Mead writes, “Research has shown that endorphins released during a pleasant experience have a salutary effect on a person with dementia even after the experience is forgotten” (p. 95). At Beatitudes, a care facility practicing a new model of dementia care in Phoenix AZ, Mead continues, staff “tries to provide residents with pleasurable moments throughout the day.”

I suspect that those same endorphins work for me, and I haven’t been diagnosed with dementia yet. I also suspect that the observation can be expanded into a general principle: a life with pleasurable moments throughout the day is likely to be a good life