The life that fits you may disappoint the version of you that wanted to impress everybody.

Much of what people aim at is addressed to an audience assembled long ago, often in adolescence. A life built around your actual temperament will look modest to that audience: the smaller role, the quieter town, the week with nothing in it worth reporting. There is real loss in that, and it deserves naming rather than skipping past. The disappointment belongs to a version of you, not to the life.

Ask who exactly you picture being impressed, and how recently you have spoken to them. Then ask whether you would trade your ordinary Tuesday for theirs.