So I recently went down a rabbit hole watching Instagram reels about a Yale professor named Dr. Laurie Santos, and it genuinely changed how I think about happiness.
Back in 2018, Santos launched a course called “The Science of Well-Being.” It ended up becoming the most popular class in Yale’s entire 300-year history, and when she put it online, over 3 million people signed up. The whole course basically comes down to one uncomfortable truth: the stuff we think will make us happy pretty much doesn’t.
More money, the “right” relationship, a bigger room, better grades, the promotion, people finally noticing us – decades of research say none of it sticks. Not because those things are bad, just because our brains were never built to stay happy because of them.
Here’s why: our brains evolved to chase status, resources, and safety, because that’s literally what kept our ancestors alive. Great for the savanna. Not so great for modern life, where those instincts are kind of miscalibrated. Scientists call the mess-up “miswanting”, meaning that our brain predicts something will make us happy, it’s wrong, and it never updates the prediction. So we keep chasing the same stuff on repeat.
There’s also this thing called hedonic adaptation, basically our brain’s way of turning any good thing into background noise. You get the thing you wanted for months, feel amazing for like two weeks, and then it just becomes normal. The treadmill doesn’t slow down, it speeds up.
So what actually works? Not exciting stuff, unfortunately. Real relationships. Being kind to people. Sleep. Movement. Actually noticing good moments instead of scrolling past them. And weirdly specific gratitude; not a vague “I’m thankful for my life” list, but literally texting one person one specific thing they did and how it made you feel. Research says that one habit alone creates longer-lasting happiness than almost anything else studied.
None of this means stop having goals. It just means maybe stop expecting the next thing to finally make you feel okay, and start paying attention to what already quietly works.
We’re not broken for wanting stuff that doesn’t work. Our brains just need an update. Good news: it’s already available, we just have to actually install it.
Reference:
Lyubomirsky, S., Sheldon, K. M., & Schkade, D. (2005). Pursuing happiness: The architecture of sustainable change. Review of General Psychology, 9(2), 111–131. https://doi.org/10.1037/1089-2680.9.2.111
Meet Dr. Laurie Santos:
https://www.drlauriesantos.com/
Newsletter Sign-up Dr. Laurie Santos:
https://www.drlauriesantos.com/newsletter-signup?
