Abstract
What version of the good life do people want the most, and when do they want it? This paper investigates the relative preference for happiness, meaning, and psychological richness across time. We predicted that people want a happy life consistently high, but express a lower preference for meaning and psychological richness in their ideal present than in their ideal future and past – reflecting time-inconsistent preferences for the good life. This hypothesis was supported in three experiments (N=2,289; USA). Compared to the present, people preferred more meaning and psychological richness when thinking ahead about the rest of their life, and when imagining looking back from the future to the present. Moreover, self-generated preferred activities in the ideal present were less meaningful and psychologically rich than preferred activities in the ideal future and past. The time-inconsistent preference for meaning and psychological richness was moderated by trait self-control, and mediated by perceived effort.