“I’m not happy and I don’t know why..”
A common theme I hear a lot from clients when we start working together.
Despite their success and accomplishments, an underlying feeling of discontent and that something’s missing.
The psychological term for this is the 'arrival fallacy’. It explains the human tendency to think the “next big thing”, goal or milestone will bring us happiness.
The premise: “when ____ happens, i'll feel ____.”
It goes like this:
You reach the goal and feel great for a bit, but the initial joy tends to be fleeting.
Soon, we find ourselves setting our sights on the next target.
This cycle continues, and we never find the satisfaction we seek.
It's like being on a hamster wheel that just keeps spinning, and despite all the effort we exert, we feel stuck in place.
When we define ourselves (and our happiness) only from our next big milestone, the obsession with achieving things can take over our lives where our self-worth is tied to our output and we feel anxious and self-critical about not getting enough done. The perpetual cycle of always seeking more makes it hard to appreciate where we are now and the progress we’ve already made.
Rather than believing happiness is just beyond the finish line of (insert goal here), what if instead we considered that we have most of what we need to be happy right now?
That the real value of any pursuit are the joys beyond achievement:
The lessons, the meaningful connections—and the memories you make along the way. When you look at it that way, you gain something whether you reach the top or not.
There’s no distant finish line. Happiness isn’t some future thing, there's no need to focus on arriving—because you’re already here.
