The Psychology of Your Future Self and How Your Present Illusions Hinder Your Future Happiness

This future-focused attitude often takes the form of what I once heard described as the “‘when-I-finally’ mind,” as in: “When I finally get my workload under control/get my candidate elected/find the right romantic partner/sort out my psychological issues, then I can relax, and the life I was always meant to be living can begin.”

“Human beings are works in progress that mistakenly think they’re finished,” says Harvard professor Daniel Gilbert, whose study subjects said they’d changed hugely in the years prior but insisted they were done and in the future wouldn’t change anymore.