Do you ever feel overwhelmed and exhausted from the hustle and bustle of life? You’re not alone.

Many of us, especially entrepreneurs and executives, have to balance intense workloads with personal obligations. This can take its toll on our mental health and well-being. Fortunately, neuroscience has some great ways to help us find balance and foster feelings of happiness in our daily lives.

Here’s the thing: Happiness doesn’t work the way we think it does.

We generally have it backwards.

We figure we do the things, we will get what we want, and then we will be happy.

Then what happens is something called hedonic adaptation.

Hedonic adaptation is the psychological phenomenon where happiness created by an event, experience or achievement quickly decreases over time due to familiarity with the positive occurrence.

Simply put, it’s the reason why the new thing we get seems less and less special over time. It’s why focusing all our attention on pleasure-seeking will decrease our sense of happiness.

Hedonic adaptation plays an important role in happiness because it’s what leads us to pursue “the-next-thing” that we think will make us happy.

On one hand, hedonic adaptation can be beneficial because it encourages people to strive for new accomplishments and better experiences. On the other hand, it can also lead some people to expect happiness from material possessions that turn out to be fleeting.

Understanding hedonic adaptation helps us realize how happiness isn’t found in tangible things and can instead be found in moments of joy, nurturing relationships and pursuing activities that bring us joy. And what do all of these have in common? They harness the power of presence and attention.

How do we harness that power? Stay tuned for part 2.