Arthur Brooks

I need goals I can't meet.

Part of the reason is because what strivers they get into, there's actually a pathology that is in the middle of this.

So what you find is that certain people...

Let me back up a little bit.

I work, I'm sort of the striver whisperer.

In my work, I specialize in people who do incredible things, right?

And that's just because that's fun, although it is, but because that's the kind of books that I write.

You know, people who do amazing things and still don't have perfect lives.

That's kind of my area of research, as a matter of fact.

They have a common childhood and it kind of looks like this.

You know, super strivers who are never satisfied and struggle.

They, generally speaking, found that they only got attention and affection from their parents when they did something, when they got good grades, when they made pitcher on a baseball team, when they made first chair in the orchestra, when they, right?

When they, you know, set up a lemonade stand and made more money than anybody thought possible, whatever it was, right?

And their parents, often their parents are immigrants or came from poverty, and they'll reward their kids when they do a thing, thinking that they're actually wiring in success and happiness for their kids.

What they're telling their kids is that love is earned.

They're teaching their kids that love is earned.

And kids will learn that.

And when your brain is synaptically plastic, boy, will you ever learn that lesson.

And then you will go through life trying to earn love over and over and over and over again.

You'll look for, if you're a man, you'll look for women who make you earn their love, right?