| As one of those achievers[1] I think it's even worse than you say. I have pretty much made peace with the fact that I am going to be fundamentally miserable for most if not all of my life. The reason why that is, is because even though I never do things just because others want me to do them[2], I am still very much driven by success and achievement. Not because society compels me to achieve, but because there is an internal drive that just will not shut up. Kundera explained it well in Lightness of Being - there is an inner voice that says you have to. You must. Even though you know full well following this path does not make you happy, moving away from that voice makes you even more miserable. Just because you're not following your talents/gifts[3]. When it comes to success vs. failure. Succeeding brings with it doubts in terms of whether you're succeeding rapidly enough, whether there's more you could be doing, whether your goals are high enough. When you're failing, you're failing and failing never feels good. And there's nothing that even compares to the emptiness that comes when you achieve a goal. It's soul crushing. All that work and now you're done ... what can you possibly do with your life now? What else is there? What's the next step? If I could achieve this goal, was it even lofty enough? In the end, I've learned to simply manage my depression and live with it. [1] I think I fall in the camp, it's hard to say, I've never achieved much that the outside world would laud me for, but I tend to behave like achievers do and have been obsessed with success/achievement ever since I can remember [2] ask anyone, I am impossible to motivate externally. Beating me with a stick until I do what you ask would probably work eventually, but that's a tad severe. [3] great Oglaf comic on the topic of talents/gifts wanting to be used: http://oglaf.com/gifted/ |
I also feel that same drive where I get restless when I feel my talents are being wasted. I think a lot of people do. But when my talents are actually being used, I don't feel miserable or unhappy, but rather content. I think this may be because I don't think in terms of "Am I accomplishing everything I set out to do? Have I made enough of a mark on the world?", but rather in terms of "Am I doing the right things? Am I following the path that will maximize my contributions to the world, given the information I have available?" (Okay, admittedly I've fallen into thinking like the former on occasion, and I tend to become miserably neurotic when I do. But I've worked pretty hard to try and view things in the latter light.)
The former puts the locus of control on the outside world, where you feel responsible for the effects of your actions, even if those effects are outside your control. The latter puts the locus of control on yourself, about your choices. In theory (and in my experience), success follows as a consequence of doing the right things, not as a cause.
And then when I find that something is preventing me from doing the right thing, I ask what it is. Very often, it's myself, and I have some internal fear I need to face and get over. Sometimes, it's someone else, in which case it's time to cut that person or organization out of my life.