Ambition is a beautiful thing. Striving for that new job, client so you can get that better pay check for the better house or holiday. But at what point does wanting more trip over to discontentment.
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Does our eternal striving cost us our happiness in the end. Sarah, Gemma, Shelley and Jade share their honest thoughts on the constant drive to “do more” to the guilt of slowing down, this conversation explores the fine line between ambition and exhaustion.
Full Transcript
Today’s word is: more. More success, more money, more followers, more house, more holidays, more everything. But here’s the question no one really asks — at what point does more start costing you your happiness? We live in a world that tells us we can have it all, and if we’re not actively chasing the next thing, we’re somehow falling behind. But what if we already have everything that we once prayed for?
There’s something telling about the reaction many of us have when someone points out that we’ve already got everything we’ve been working for. The immediate response, often, is discomfort. Please don’t tell me that — because it actually makes me feel worse. So why is that?
Have you ever thought, “When I get there, I’ll finally feel…” — whatever that thing is? Have you ever hit a goal and felt strangely flat? Most people have. Every time, in fact. And for some of us, we move the goalposts before we even reach them — so we never actually hit the goal at all.
It’s natural. We have this remarkable ability to adapt, and that’s part of our human makeup. We get somewhere, adapt to it quickly, forget it was ever the thing we were striving for, and move on. The conscious effort required is to just stop for a minute — smell the roses, be where you are, and use gratitude for where you’ve landed as the springboard for the next thing. It’s a fine line between not staying still forever and not pausing at all.
There’s more excitement in the chase than there is in the prize, sometimes. They say it’s the journey — and there’s truth in that. Though perhaps if the thing we’re chasing has real depth and emotional meaning behind it, we’d appreciate it more when we arrived. Maybe the reasons behind wanting something are the things that actually need addressing.
There are moments, of course, when the arrival does feel as extraordinary as we imagined. Having children. A long-dreamed-of milestone finally reached. Those moments that feel exactly as hoped — or even better — and the thrill and joy lasts. Those are the ones we spend the rest of our lives chasing again. Nothing quite gets it. It’s a dopamine hit — the ultimate one. And you can understand, from there, how gold medal syndrome becomes a real thing. I got that high. I need to feel it again. It’s intoxicating. It’s addictive. And there is a very real association between high achievers and addiction — not just in celebrity culture, but more broadly.
And then there are the times when we chase and chase and chase, and finally land the thing — the business deal, the milestone, the moment — and feel nothing. Picked up the phone. It’s done. And then went to bed feeling absolutely flat.
So do we just keep chasing? Or do we find that feeling within normal life? Because is success really measured in wealth and things — or is it sitting on the sofa having a cuddle with your family, understanding the health and love you have together? That is pure success too. And it’s something many of us have had to consciously reframe — sitting in the discomfort of not chasing, recognising what we already have rather than fixating on what we think we need. A smaller house that’s actually a home. A to-do list that’s still ambitious but feels more human. That’s worth more than we give it credit for.
It’s deeply uncomfortable, though, because we’re wired to level up. Who wants to come back down the staircase when they’re halfway up it? But the cost of endless chasing is burnout. You will never be satisfied. You’ll just be chasing a different high — and it might not even be work. It might be other things entirely. Drink. Stuff. Distraction. Anything to feel something.
Health is the ultimate wealth. Most of us wake up healthy by default and don’t think twice about it. The minute any part of that changes — for a short time or a long one — everything else pales. That’s when perspective arrives, and it’s a shame it takes that sometimes.
A therapist once said something that stopped someone in their tracks: ordinary is where the magic is. The response was, understandably, what? But sit with it. Because when you write down the happiest moment of your day, it’s almost always something simple. Something small. Something to do with the people you love. And yet we spend eight hours chasing something else entirely.
There’s something called the arrival fallacy — the idea that when we achieve the next milestone, we’ll finally be happy. But humans adapt quickly, and the high fades. And more, very often, comes at a cost.
For women today, the cost is particularly acute. We are expected — largely by ourselves — to be everything. The capable homemaker, the gentle and disciplined mother, the ambitious career woman, the one who walks ten thousand steps and avoids gluten but still lives her best life. All the things. And if you’re somehow managing most of that? Great. Now do more. We’ve got used to expecting more of ourselves, and that’s precisely where the cost comes in. Something gets dropped. Something gets sacrificed. And often we can’t even name what it was — only that it cost something.
The biggest cost, almost always, is time. Everything costs time. And since having children, that cost is felt most sharply there. Every choice to pursue something means something else goes without — and specifically, it means your children go without some of your time. So the question becomes: is it worth it? Sometimes yes. Sometimes you have to learn that it isn’t.
There are people who have given so much of themselves — to a career, a relationship, a vision of the future — only to find that the thing they built it around is gone. And then what was the point? That question can feel devastating. But the answer isn’t to go back — it’s to sit in the discomfort of the present and ask what’s actually here, right now, that’s worth something. And sometimes what’s here is more than we gave ourselves credit for.
If joy were your compass — not the empty, undefined something you’re chasing — what would change? What would you do more of? What would you stop? It’s worth asking. There’s always a cost to doing nothing too, of course. You can’t rewind and choose differently and assume you’d be happier. There’s a cost to every path, including the quieter ones. But we were wired in school to believe success is wealth, success is the best job, success is the thing on the CV. Not that success could be happiness. Not that success could be joy.
Digging deeper into what’s already there — rather than endlessly trying to reinvent and expand — is its own kind of ambition. Imagining the roots of a tree going into the ground, and things flourishing from there. Not what else, what next, what more — but what’s already here that I haven’t fully explored yet?
To anyone who has worked incredibly hard to build their life and doesn’t feel as happy as they thought they would: that doesn’t make you ungrateful. You can be grateful and still want more. The fun, as many people eventually discover, was often in the journey — in the grind, in the building, in the striving. That doesn’t feel like it at the time. But zoom out. What’s working? What isn’t? What were you actually chasing, and was it necessary?
It’s brave to admit you don’t feel as happy as you expected. Most people keep the pretense — to others and to themselves — because looking at it honestly feels scarier. But if you’re willing to ask yourself why seven times over, you’ll usually find the real thing underneath. It often starts with not feeling grateful for where you are and ends, several layers down, with wanting more time with the people you love. And if that’s the answer, the question becomes simple: what would it look like to just take that time?
