I think it has to do with the cognitive dissonance between society's judgement onto individuals to amass wealth and that individual's sense of personal fulfillm

I think it has to do with the cognitive dissonance between society's judgement onto individuals to amass wealth and that individual's sense of personal fulfillment. Suppose you're an immigrant who won the H1B lottery to come to US from Nepal and earn 10-20x the notional amount of income you'd at home, way more than your parents. Would you be happy? Like the immigrant, children of the families whose mom's earned only $20K was launched from their socio-economicsphere to another one, the millionaire and above and one citizen in the elite citizenry of one million. Like the immigrant, the children of suddenly acquired wealth still identify the values of his/her original "homeland," values such as humility and hard work instead of vanities and the weariness of those who have had a luxury to be "anxious" about self-fulfillment. The immigrants will not find a sense of belonging, a sense of even accomplishment in the new land. Strangely, they find themselves bewildered as their families and the mantras of what they've been reciting all their lives all have touted as the "touchstone" of their journey. Now that they've arrived, they feel first elated, then slight flatlined, then keeping up the appearances and confused and then cheated and robbed. We've been telling ourselves that starting that startup, taking that job offer, going that school will enable us to have the X: the money, the respect, the cachet, the X and only after X, we'll be whole and then we'll really do the Y, what we really want to do. Or we lock ourselves in a mental prison, disavowing what society have imposed on us regarding X and paint a black & white picture of us pursuing Y and the man forcing X on our throat. But why do we not consider ourselves whole? That is the question we push to the back of my mind chasing the X's and Y's of the day in an attempt to make up for the feeling of incompleteness (like a snake devouring its tail).