One person's heaven is another person's hell. This description of self-actualization sounds a lot like the concept behind Siddhartha's goals of finding nirvana. I've thought a lot on the idea of having nothing that can upset me throughout my young adult life, and I keep coming to the realization that having nothing to solve would eventually bore me. I personally thrive on change. Being a monk would drive me insane. However, the idea of striving for my absolute perfection would absolutely tear me apart! Never being happy with where I am at this particular moment in time would be to spend the majority if not the entirety of my life never knowing the contentment of living in the present.
Well said. But for me, striving for better-ness does not imply that I an not happy with where I am right now. I'm comfortable and satisfied with where I am (not least because I know which direction I'm heading in). And when I look back over my life, and see the times at which I hadn't yet made so much of myself, they're generally still pretty good: I have, so far - on average - lived a happy life. That's not to say that bad things haven't happened; that I haven't had hard times and emotional struggles. Just to say that I've typically been happy throughout, and that I've learned to do better and better and finding happiness.