Agreed, but it sounds like you are phrasing it in negative context.

My take is that man has more mental capacity to see into the future than an animal and therefore he has to make opportunity cost choices with the currency being time and self. This is why we value the "expectation" more than the present situation, it is the return on investment from our choices. The ultimate goal isn't about being happy but about growth and developing the self.

The highest reward for a man's toil is not what he gets for it, but what he becomes by it. - John Ruskin