Gemma Spake

It stops us from experimenting.

It stops us from like sometimes doing anything at all.

Let's break those down one by one.

The problem with being extraordinary is that it never lasts, even if

You do achieve everything you want.

It's a mirage.

Once you have met the expectations that you set for yourself or somebody else set for you, the bar is always going to be raised because that is the pure definition of extraordinary.

It pushes boundaries.

Being extraordinary is about being constantly challenged and it runs off this hyper-competitive narrative in society.

I'm sure many of us have had this experience whereby we're

We achieve one thing, we are so happy about it for about a minute, and then we are already looking towards the next thing and the next.

This feeling has a name in psychology.

It's called achievement adaptation.

It's very similar to hedonic adaptation.

Basically, it is the tendency to overestimate things.

how great big achievements are going to make you feel long-term and to essentially become desensitized to your own efforts and accomplishments such that all good feelings lose their impact over time.

So basically it's like an addiction, like

You need more and more to feel happy.

Every bar that you rise to meet will be raised and you will feel like you are not doing enough to get there.

Some of the most like conventionally successful people you know struggle with this.