by Dr. Jeffrey DeSarbo

On a quiet Sunday morning, two people sit at their kitchen tables across town from one another, each stirring the last swirl of milk into their coffee when the same thought arrives: “I really should start a bucket list.” Both feel the small lift in their chest that comes with imagining something new. Both mean it sincerely.

But one reaches for a pen. The other reaches for their inbox and retreats into the familiar rhythm of the day. This split-second divergence is not a psychological weakness or lack of ambition. It is something more subtle: the way the brain interprets desire.

How do their mornings each play out? Alex is the one who becomes a bucket lister. Jordan is the one who wants to but can’t seem to begin. These two are not opposites. In fact, they are almost twins in temperament. The true difference is subtle but crucial: their neural circuits process desire along distinct pathways, shaping their trajectories.

Jordan: The Brain That Means Well But Stays Still

Jordan’s desire to make a bucket list is real. The thought alone activates a flicker of anticipatory dopamine, part of the brain’s motivational circuitry. But moments later, the idea is handed off to the Default Mode Network (DMN), a group of brain regions responsible for self-reflection, autobiographical memory, and internal dialogue; essentially, the mind’s background narrative.

The DMN has a wary tone. It whispers familiar lines: “Is this really necessary?” “You’ve never been great at sticking to lists.” “Maybe next month, things are too busy right now.”

In individuals with stronger DMN dominance, a state where the Default Mode Network's inward focus prevails, introspective thinking can slip into over-evaluation and caution. Research consistently shows that a hyperactive DMN correlates with worry, self-doubt, and avoidance of uncertain goals.^1,2  Jordan doesn’t consciously choose avoidance; Jordan’s DMN simply frames wanting as unsafe.

Clinically, I’ve seen this pattern often. One patient told me listing future desires “would hurt too much if life didn’t cooperate.” Her amygdala, sensitive to emotional threat, redirected hope into protective pessimism. She wasn’t avoiding a list, but rather the vulnerability of hope.

Jordan lives in that tension. The desire remains, but the brain reroutes it into stillness.

Alex: The Brain That Moves the Pen

Alex wakes with the same spark of curiosity, yet their brain takes a slightly different route. Instead of looping the desire back into the DMN’s evaluative monologue, the salience network, a system highlighting what is important, tags it as meaningful enough to pass forward. The Central Executive Network (CEN), which is managed by the prefrontal cortex and is responsible for planning and working memory, takes on the task.

Rather than asking whether the idea is reasonable, Alex’s CEN asks a simpler question: “What might I write first?” This is the neuroscience equivalent of a door opening. The shift from the Default Mode Network (DMN), which is linked to self-reflection and mind-wandering, to the Central Executive Network (CEN), responsible for focused, goal-oriented thinking, is documented across studies of goal-setting and future-oriented thinking and enables action rather than rumination.^3,4,5  Once Alex writes even a single item, dopamine (a neurotransmitter associated with motivation and reward) reinforces the behavior, and neuroplasticity-supporting factors, such as brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), begin to increase as new experiences take shape.⁶

I treated a man in his 40s who started his bucket list with: visit the botanical garden near his office. That simple act led to renewed creativity and agency. “Writing it down made it real,” he said. “It stopped being a fantasy and became a direction.”

This is what happens inside Alex’s brain. Not magic. Not personality. Structure.

Two Lives Quietly Diverge

By spring, Alex has done just one small thing on the list: taken a weekend photography class. Nothing dramatic. No social media declarations. Yet this single act stimulates novelty circuits (the brain’s learning and curiosity pathways), enhances emotional regulation, and improves functional connectivity across the brain’s major networks.⁷

Jordan, meanwhile, feels a low, restless dissatisfaction that is difficult to articulate. This is common among individuals who chronically suppress desire; unmet longing creates an emotional dissonance that the brain registers as stress, even when the person cannot name the source.⁸

Patients often describe this as “the feeling that life is happening near me but not to me,” and seems like a quiet erosion of vitality.

What Truly Separates Them: Not Ambition, but Permission

Jordan likes bucket lists. Jordan believes in the benefits. Jordan wants to begin. But Jordan’s brain perceives wanting as a risk. Alex’s brain perceives wanting as information.

This difference, rooted in the brain’s interpretation, transforms desire into either a blueprint or a burden. Bucket listing is not a task. It is an act of self-permission. It is the moment the mind accepts that one’s future is still expandable. And here’s the part people rarely say aloud: starting a bucket list isn’t about knowing what you want. It’s about agreeing that you’re allowed to want.

A Future Moment of Recognition

Years later, Alex and Jordan run into each other for lunch. Alex tells stories about unexpected adventures, a pottery class, a last-minute trip to go rafting, reconnecting with an old mentor who now lives in Italy. Jordan listens, not with envy, but with a soft ache of recognition.

Driving home, Jordan feels the old thought rise again: “I really should start a bucket list.” But this time, something in the tone has shifted. It feels less like a suggestion and more like a beginning. Jordan doesn’t open the phone. Jordan reaches for a pen.

The Neuroscience of Bucket List Avoidance

The hesitation to create a bucket list often emerges from the interaction of three major brain networks. Individuals who delay or avoid bucket listing frequently demonstrate stronger dominance of the Default Mode Network (DMN), the system responsible for introspection, autobiographical memory, and internal narration. When the DMN, a collection of regions involved in internal thought and reminiscing, becomes overactive, it amplifies rumination, self-doubt, and risk-focused internal dialogue, making future-oriented desires feel uncertain or unsafe.^1,2

The salience network, centered around the anterior insula and acting as the brain’s filter for what matters, determines what deserves attention at any given moment. During periods of stress, fatigue, or emotional overload, this network prioritizes immediate demands and suppresses non-urgent, future-oriented intentions, which causes bucket list desires to fall off the cognitive radar.⁶

Individuals who create bucket lists tend to transition more effectively into the Central Executive Network (CEN). The CEN, involving the prefrontal cortex, is responsible for managing planning and goal-directed actions. This shift away from DMN-driven self-evaluation and toward CEN-driven planning is associated with greater emotional regulation, increased cognitive flexibility, and enhanced goal-directed behavior.^3,4,5

Once bucket list actions begin, dopaminergic pathways, a system that reinforces rewarding behaviors, reinforce movement toward desired experiences. Neuroplasticity-supporting factors, especially BDNF, a protein that helps the brain adapt and grow, rise with novelty and learning, strengthening circuits that encode reward and exploratory behavior. Over time, these changes support autonomy, resilience, and an expanded sense of personal possibility .^7,8

Avoiding desire carries measurable costs. Research shows that suppressing or avoiding valued goals correlates with increased psychological distress, reduced well-being, and impaired ability to pursue personally meaningful actions, even in the presence of discomfort.⁹  Chronic stress further compounds this avoidance by maladaptively altering neural connectivity across motivation-related networks.¹⁰

Ultimately, the difference between those who list and those who don’t is character, it is neural interpretation. Some brains treat desire as a threat; others treat desire as information. The good news is that the circuitry can change. Even small steps toward curiosity can begin shifting the brain toward networks that support growth, vitality, and possibility.

REFERENCE LIST

1.     Andrews-Hanna JR. The default network and self-generated thought: component processes, dynamic control, and clinical relevance. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2014;1316(1):29–52. doi:10.1111/nyas.12360.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24502540/

2.     Hamilton JP, Farmer M, Fogelman P, Gotlib IH. Depressive rumination, the default-mode network, and the dark matter of clinical neuroscience. Biol Psychiatry. 2015;78(4):224–230. doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2015.02.020.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25861700/

3.     Menon V. Large-scale brain networks and psychopathology: a unifying triple network model. Trends Cogn Sci. 2011;15(10):483–506. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2011.08.003.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21908230/

4.     Spreng RN, Stevens WD, Chamberlain JP, Gilmore AW, Schacter DL. Default network activity, coupled with the frontoparietal control network, supports goal-directed cognition. Neuroimage. 2010;53(1):303–317. doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2010.06.016.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20600998/

5.     Dixon ML, De La Vega A, Mills C, Andrews-Hanna J, Spreng RN, Cole MW, Christoff K. Heterogeneity within the frontoparietal control network and its relationship to the default and dorsal attention networks. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2018;115(7):E1598–E1607. doi:10.1073/pnas.1715766115.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29382744/

6.     Uddin LQ. Salience processing and insular cortical function and dysfunction. Nat Rev Neurosci. 2015;16(1):55–61. doi:10.1038/nrn3857.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25406711/

7.     Castrén E, Antila H. Neuronal plasticity and neurotrophic factors in drug responses. Mol Psychiatry. 2017;22(8):1085–1095. doi:10.1038/mp.2017.61.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28397840/

8.     Liu X, Hairston J, Schrier M, Fan J. Common and distinct networks underlying reward valence and processing stages: a meta-analysis of functional neuroimaging studies. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2011;35(5):1219–1236. doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2010.12.012.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21185861/

9.     Kashdan TB, Disabato DJ, Goodman FR, Doorley JD, McKnight PE. Understanding psychological flexibility: a multimethod exploration of pursuing valued goals despite the presence of distress. Psychol Assess. 2020;32(9):829–850. doi:10.1037/pas0000834.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32614192/

10.   McEwen BS. Stress, adaptation, and disease. Allostasis and allostatic load. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 1998;840:33–44. doi:10.1111/j.1749-6632.1998.tb09546.x.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9629234/