Dealing with Feeling The Happiness Trap, and Why 'More' Never Feels like Enough with Dr. Laurie Santos
Jan 28, 2026
Dr. Laurie Santos, a Yale psychologist who studies wellbeing and teaches the science of happiness, explores why chasing more often backfires. She discusses miswanting, our obsession with the future, time affluence, the gap between feeling happy moment-to-moment and being satisfied with life, and why social connection and emotional skills matter. Short experiments and small habit shifts get highlighted as ways to test what truly helps.
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Campus Well-Being Has Fallen Dramatically
- Yale students show large declines in social connection, conversation skills, and mental health compared with 20 years ago.
- Laurie Santos links this to technology, heightened stakes, and pre-professional burnout.
Schedule Free Time Intentionally
- Give yourself deliberate free time to cultivate time affluence and reduce overwhelm.
- Laurie Santos assigns no-work hours so students experience spontaneous socializing and rest.
Hyper-Focus On The Future Harms Today
- Students often 'hyper-focus' on a fantasy future and mortgage their present well-being for imagined success.
- That future-focused strategy undermines relationships, sleep, and current positive emotions.
