The Truth About New Years Resolutions and Happiness
How Overemphasizing Resolutions Can Steer You Away from True Fulfillment
As you reflect on your New Year’s resolutions, beware of over-focusing on specific goals. Whether health, wealth, or happiness, placing too much emphasis on one area can leave you feeling unfulfilled, even when you achieve what you want. Why does this happen, and what can we do to avoid it?
Understanding the Focusing Illusion
The Focusing Illusion is a cognitive bias in which people place disproportionate emphasis on a single aspect of life, overestimating its importance in their overall happiness or well-being. This distortion often causes people to misjudge what truly matters.
Psychologist Daniel Kahneman summarizes it best:
“Nothing in life is as important as you think it is while you are thinking about it.”
How the Focusing Illusion Works
When people fixate on one particular element—money, career success, or location—they magnify its perceived impact on their satisfaction. Meanwhile, other factors influencing well-being are ignored.
Here are some common examples:
1. Geographic Living Conditions
Many believe, “If I moved to a warm, sunny climate, I’d be much happier.” While sunshine might provide a temporary mood boost, other factors like social connections and work satisfaction often outweigh it.
2. Wealth
People frequently assume that earning significantly more money will make them substantially happier. However, research shows that after basic needs are met, additional income offers diminishing returns on happiness.
3. Health
While poor health can reduce happiness, people in good health often overestimate how much it influences their overall satisfaction, neglecting the importance of relationships, purpose, and other contributors.
4. Job Promotions
Many believe a promotion will drastically improve their life, but they may overlook potential downsides such as increased stress or reduced free time.
I am sure we can think of others. Comment with the one you think most people would add to this list.
Why Does the Focusing Illusion Happen?
Three key drivers create the impact of the Focusing Illusion:
1. Salience Bias
We tend to fixate on what stands out or feels most relevant at the moment, ignoring the broader picture.
2. Neglect of Adaptation
Humans adapt to changes—positive or negative—more quickly than expected. This hedonic adaptation diminishes the long-term significance of any one element.
3. Limited Perspective
People often assess situations narrowly when making judgments, failing to account for all the factors influencing happiness.
How to Counteract the Focusing Illusion
As you set your New Year’s resolutions, here are four strategies to help you avoid this bias:
Broaden Your Perspective
When making a significant decision, consider multiple factors that contribute to happiness rather than fixating on one. For instance, consider how it will affect your relationships, personal growth, and daily routines.
Acknowledge Adaptation
Recognize that positive and negative changes will likely feel less impactful over time than initially.
Seek Balance
Focus on various life aspects—health, relationships, work, and hobbies—to cultivate holistic well-being.
Use Data to Ground Expectations
Rely on research and evidence to keep your expectations realistic. For example, studies show that more income does not significantly boost happiness beyond a certain point.
It’s natural to make ambitious resolutions, sometimes even ones that seem unattainable, to motivate yourself. But ask yourself: Is this truly what will make me happy, or is it just a story I’m telling myself?
A version of the focusing illusion can occur over time as well. My mother (a clinical phychologist) once described a common phenomenon among her patients that she called "levelling and sharpening." When reflecting on our own lives and the historic events we've lived through, most things blend into the background (leveling), but certain events or activities take on exaggerated significance (sharpening). The sharpend things could serve a healthly purpose such as emphasizing the positive and crowding out the negative ("...but we'll always have Paris!); they could be harmlessly or mildly intrusive ("...did I ever tell you about the time I...?"); or they could become harmful or even all-consuming obsessions ("...since my daughter [did that thing that has taken on exaggerated significance because of my own focusing illusion], she's dead to me now.!").