I think a corollary to this is the relatively modern idea that life needs purpose in the form of measurable accomplishments.
Looking back at how most people lived their lives, it was sustenance, interspersed with things like family, religion, and friendship (if you were lucky). Nearly nobody owned much, nearly nobody 'did cool things,' nearly nobody was famous.
They all just had a part of life (surviving) that they knew was bad and hard work, then they tried as hard as they could to escape that briefly.
Now, we expect work to be fulfilling and non-work to be fulfilling. For the majority of people where that isn't true, it feels really depressing, which is compounded by the fact that society pushes you to spend more time on improving the work side of things (which again for most people will not be intrinsically fulfilling no matter how hard they try), so they end up feeling lonely and sad.
Looking back at how most people lived their lives, it was sustenance, interspersed with things like family, religion, and friendship (if you were lucky). Nearly nobody owned much, nearly nobody 'did cool things,' nearly nobody was famous.
They all just had a part of life (surviving) that they knew was bad and hard work, then they tried as hard as they could to escape that briefly.
Now, we expect work to be fulfilling and non-work to be fulfilling. For the majority of people where that isn't true, it feels really depressing, which is compounded by the fact that society pushes you to spend more time on improving the work side of things (which again for most people will not be intrinsically fulfilling no matter how hard they try), so they end up feeling lonely and sad.