Krähenmann

In our secular society, individuals are urged to find meaning in their lives despite limited opportunities. While inner hero’s journeys convey a sense of purpose, depth, and belonging, apparent promises of happiness, such as self-optimization, are gaining increasing traction. This exploratory study aims to investigate whether students perceive self-optimization as a path to a good life and how it relates to transformative journeys. Utilizing a combination of semi-structured interviews and a quantitatively analyzed questionnaire, the societal views of students, their practices and motivations for self-optimization, notions of a good life, and interconnections are explored. In the post-heroic, secular, and performance-oriented society described by students, the majority expects to self-improve. The analysis reveals that only a small fraction experiences transformative journeys, while others strive for happiness in seemingly transformative developments like self-optimization or other life projects. The hypothesis that this pursuit of happiness is based on incomplete understandings of meaning and self-awareness should be examined in further studies.