The Paradox of Progress and Well-Being

The disconnect between material advancement and psychological health

We live in a paradoxical historical era. If we look at objective statistics, the average Western human being has access to comforts that the kings of centuries ago could not even dream of: clean water, air conditioning, antibiotics, unlimited access to information, instant entertainment, and very high relative physical security. However, mental health indicators do not reflect this material well-being.

Rates of suicide, depression, anxiety and psychotropic drug use are at record highs and continue to rise.

ACT posits that this phenomenon is due to a misapplication of our cognitive tools.

The human mind is a brilliant machine for solving external problems: if it is cold, we build a house; if there is an infection, we create a drug.

We have learned that if we don't like something in the physical world, we can fix it, eliminate it or avoid it.

The fatal error occurs when we apply this same "problem-solving" logic to our internal world.

When we feel an emotion we don't like (anxiety, sadness), we assume it is a "problem" that must be eliminated, just as we would eliminate a termite infestation at home. But thoughts and emotions don't work that way; they are not physical objects.

By trying to "fix" or suppress them using the same rules we use for the outside world, we often exacerbate suffering, creating a society that has everything material but lacks the ability to be with itself.

Deconstructing the Myth of Constant Happiness

Our Western culture and the wellness industry have sold us a very damaging narrative: the natural state of being human should be happiness, and if you are not happy, calm and content most of the time, it means you are "broken," sick or doing something wrong.

We are bombarded with messages that we should pursue happiness at all costs. ACT argues that this is biologically and evolutionarily false.

Our mind did not evolve to make us happy; it evolved to make us survive in a hostile environment.

The default mind is a mind that looks for dangers, that compares, that foresees the worst to protect us. Emotions are like the weather: they change continuously.

Expecting it to always be sunny (happiness) is not only unrealistic, but leads us to become frustrated every time it rains (sadness).

By assuming that "normality" is constant happiness, we pathologize normal human experiences.

Feeling fear in the face of uncertainty is normal; feeling sadness in the face of loss is normal.

Therapy proposes to abandon the hedonistic pursuit of happiness (understood as feeling good all the time) because it is a trap that leads to avoidance.

Instead, it proposes to seek eudaimonic happiness: a sense of purpose and vitality that comes from living coherently with our values, accepting that this path will include sunny days and stormy days.

Summary

We live in a historical paradox where high material well-being and physical security coexist with deteriorating mental health indicators, showing increasing rates of suicide, depression and anxiety.

This phenomenon arises from misapplying the problem-solving logic of the physical world to the internal world, attempting to eliminate unpleasant emotions as if they were external threats or breakdowns.

ACT challenges the cultural narrative of constant happiness, arguing that the mind evolved for survival, not well-being, and proposes seeking a purposeful (eudaimonic) life.