Episode Details

Why Chasing Happiness Can Destroy a Meaningful Life | Kerry Cohen, PhD

What if the reason you feel empty isn't because you're broken, but because you've been chasing happiness instead of truth?

Episode Description

We're taught to want happiness, to avoid discomfort, and to measure success by how good life feels.

But in this honest, often uncomfortable conversation, Kerry Cohen, PhD challenges that story from the inside.

Joining Dov Baron, Kerry explores the difference between feeling good and being alive, and why so many high-functioning, successful people secretly feel disconnected, restless, or hollow.

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This is not a conversation about fixing yourself. It's about telling the truth about desire, grief, attachment, ambition, and the stories we inherit about what a "good life" is supposed to look like.

Kerry speaks candidly about:

• Why the pursuit of happiness can quietly numb us

• How trauma, desire, and achievement become coping strategies

• The difference between meaning and benefit

• Why grief doesn't resolve, it reshapes

• How relationships reveal unexamined wounds

• Why "healing" is often the wrong goal

• What it means to choose aliveness over comfort

This episode will resonate deeply with leaders, creatives, and high performers who have done everything "right" and still feel unsettled.

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If you're looking for reassurance, this conversation may unsettle you. If you're willing to live more honestly, it may open something important.

🔥 In This Episode

• Why happiness is an unreliable compass • How success and validation can become emotional anesthesia • The hidden bargain we make when we avoid pain • Why grief is not a problem to solve • The emotional truth beneath romantic attraction • What it means to stop waiting for life to begin

👤 About Kerry Cohen, PhD

Kerry Cohen, PhD, is a clinical psychologist, writer, and speaker known for her uncompromising honesty about desire, grief, identity, and the emotional myths that shape our lives.

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She is the author of multiple books, including memoir and non-fiction that explore intimacy, loss, and what it means to live truthfully rather than comfortably. Her work challenges the idea that healing means becoming "better," and instead invites people to become more real.

🔗 How to Connect & Learn More

• Website: https://www.kerry-cohen.com

• Books: Available wherever books are sold

• Writing & updates: Via her website

🪞 Final Reflection

A meaningful life doesn't promise happiness. It asks for honesty, courage, and the willingness to feel what's actually there.

The question isn't whether you're happy. It's whether you're fully alive.

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