American Dream or American Nightmare?

By Steve Gillman

What is the American dream? Perhaps the most common version is having a good job or business, owning a nice big home, buying new cars and other adult toys, taking regular vacations and retiring in style. But what does the pursuit of this dream do to a person, and if one does attain it, does that lead to happiness?

The American Nightmare

Jack got his degree in business administration and promptly set aside his desire to write. He took the first job that paid decently - selling office equipment to corporations. He didn't care for the work, but it paid the bills. Soon married and with children, he bought a home and started making the large payments that would continue for forty years with moves and refinancing. Once, during a vacation that he and his wife charged to their credit cards, he started the first chapter of the great novel he always wanted to write. Those two pages sat in a drawer for the rest of his life.

He was proud of his beautiful home, and they soon also had two nice new cars. With debt for a home, cars and credit cards now, there was no chance he could do anything but keep working his way into higher paying positions at the company he secretly hated working for. His neighbor bought a boat, and it looked like so much fun that Jack got one too - on credit, of course. His wife and him found a great timeshare condo near the ocean in Florida as well, and bought that. They took the kids there when they could, although life seemed to be getting too busy to visit it often.

Jack proudly showed photos of the condo to his friends, and generously let them use it once in a while. He took family and friends out on his boat when he had the time. His wife remodeled the house and they planted a large garden, bigger than any in the neighborhood. Their children had the latest video games, most popular shoes, and took karate classes each week. They were living the American Dream.

Once or twice they almost lost it all. The debt was staggering, but Jack managed to keep getting raises at work, and his wife got a job as well. They struggled for years at the brink of bankruptcy while keeping up appearances and telling nobody of their troubles. They began to fight more often. The kids had problems in school, though they agreed there was nothing they could do about that. Days went by when nobody talked to anyone else in the house. Stress was in the air like smog.

Times got better and worse over the years, and the kids moved on with their own lives as they grew up. With the debt under control, Jack was finally able to retire early at sixty-years-old. He had some ideas about what he might do in retirement, as did his wife. As it turned out, it was easier to just sit in front of the television and let the days slip by. He did enjoy the grandchildren when they came to visit, but otherwise felt no motivation to do much.

He did read more. One day, as he was reading a good novel, he briefly thought about his previous desire to write. It was too late in life to get started with that he decided. He set down the book and changed the channel on the television. Jack died at the age of sixty-seven.

Work at jobs you hate for most of your life, buy things because others own similar things, ignore your true needs, try to impress your friends and neighbors, go deep into debt, and hopefully struggle out of debt and save enough to finally stop working and start dying watching television, having forgotten what it is that you might have wanted to do at one time. That is how it sometimes looks to an outsider who doesn't play along with the American dream.

An exaggeration? Well, it's certainly not a universal experience, but look around. The current generation, for all of the advantages and riches they have, is one of the most pessimistic yet. Research shows that happiness levels declined over recent decades, even while incomes were rising in the United States (incomes are not rising at the moment). It isn't just happening here though. A recent BBC headline, reporting on research there, said, "Britain is less happy than in the 1950s - despite the fact that we are three times richer."

The general level of happiness has been climbing in poor countries which are becoming wealthier. It seems that money helps, but only to a point. Beyond that it not only doesn't help one have a happier life, but may cause even more unhappiness, at least when it is not used well. Let's take a look at how the so called "American Dream" may mislead people.

Continues here... The Trapping and Traps of Wealth

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