Andy Borowitz
Picture yourself an ascending star in your field, speeding down the highway toward success. Everything’s going smoothly and the road is clear. But one mile from arriving at your pinnacle, you stop the car, get out and walk home.
That’s what Andy Borowitz did – and he’s happier because of it.
In the 1990s, Hollywood comedian Borowitz went from being a toiling sitcom writer to creator and producer of the six-year success, “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,” which starred Will Smith. The hits continued, including “Pleasantville” with Reese Witherspoon, and Horowitz was on a rapid, star-studded ascension. Then, in 1995, he did the utterly unthinkable: Took a break. For two years.
“What I decided I really wanted to do was to kinda disappear and do nothing. Read, maybe. Then see where I am at the end of all that,” Borowitz recalled for CBS’ Harry Smith.
Borowitz wanted to avoid what psychologists call the Hedonic Treadmill, which for him meant that if you go and you do a hit TV show, you then have to do another, bigger hit to stay happy.
“And then you have to do another hit and it’s got to be bigger than that. And then you have to get a bigger house and, you know, a better dog,” he said. “I looked at my life in the ’90s – I was enormously successful, but not terribly happy, not really enjoying life, not really connecting with anything but this sort of treadmill.”
So he moved to Westchester County, north of New York City, and put aside writing and ideas for new projects. And, just as he said, he read. And he spent time with his family, which by then included daughter Alexandra and son Max.
Today, Borowitz, 53, is at the top of the food chain of political satirists and writes humor books such as, “Who Moved My Soap? The CEO’s Guide to Surviving Prison.” Mostly, he’s the creator of The Borowizt Report.
A two-year break may seem outlandish to you, so I’ll ask you to think small – like 6 weeks.
Do you think you could walk away from success for a while? Do you have the guts to do it? How much more successful and happy could your future be?
Can you hear me? Or is the hum of the alluring treadmill too loud?
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