You’re Rich.
You have a mansion with any clothes you desire and any product you dream of. It is the perfect life… right?
You have all this wealth and you gained it through working your whole life. You spent time earning that money, that means all your time was spent working.
In reality though, you forgot to live. You lacked any sense of emotional connection.
You may own a yacht, wear designer clothes and have all the money in the world. But you are alone.
Is it worth it?
The saying “money buys happiness” is commonly spoken. Wealth is portrayed as an equivalent to success. We hear this even in songs, “Material Girl” by Madonna, “7 Rings” by Ariana Grande, “9 to 5” by Dolly Parton and many more. Wealth is ingrained and normalized in our society.
And it is true, that we crave money to buy products. Hitting that “buy” button gives us an adrenaline rush. The only way to consume these goods is to make the money to afford them.
Obviously, wealth does not fall into our laps. Working and money have a direct correlation. The more you focus on your job, the more money you’ll receive.
Our society has truly emphasized the idea that new products bring you joy. Of course they do, the more companies that advertise, the more we consume, the more money we need, the more we will work and the better society will function.
We put all our attention on what occupation we are going to commit our lives to. Colleges really prepare us for our futures, but specifically, our professions.
Focusing on getting a job is important. But the urgency for a life of work overshadows the value of quality relationships.
The Harvard Study of Adult Development (known as the Grant Study) began in 1938 and is ongoing. And it proves exactly my point: quality relationships lead to fulfillment over anything else.
While wealth definitely proved to contribute to happiness, it is not the leading contributor to it. The study found that emphasis on your emotional connections is what leads to ultimate end happiness.
Gettysburg College found that “The average person will spend 90,000 hours at work over a lifetime.” In addition to that, according to The National Institute of Health, the average person spends one-third of their life sleeping. And with society’s new-found addiction to technology, NBC 10 claims that we spend an average of 12 years of our lives staring at our phones.
What is my point?
It is not to scare you. It is to open your eyes. You determine what life means to you.
We spend huge portions of our lives sleeping, and now on our technology. And with it, working to get rich.
Sometimes, we have to understand that it is okay to put our relationships over our jobs. So much of our lives are already wasted. With it, we allow the draw of wealth to pull us in, and blind us. We become workaholics.
And while we need cash to survive, that is really all we need it for. We stress being rich, we stress designer clothes and we stress trendy products. But all we truly need is to survive.
If we earn to survive, we can work less and we can love more. Loving more, connecting and bonding is what grants us ultimate happiness, something we can never purchase.
Overall, money leads to happiness but it is not everything. Our top focus should not be our jobs but the quality of our relationships.
Learn your little brother’s favorite songs and take your little sister to Starbucks. Go out to dinner with your mom and ask your dad for advice. Show interest in your grandparents’ stories, go on random blind dates and tell your friends you love them.
We have one life and it goes by quickly. Like I said, you choose what you want to get out of it.
So, I leave you with this: Would you rather be alone and rich or poor and loved? Your answer is the ultimate determination of your life’s trajectory.