The Good Life

In the world we reside in there is no shortage of systems that don’t operate correctly or even that well at all. From household items and the lives we’ve cultivated all the way to the systems that govern us its like shooting fish in a barrel to ask someone what they think is being done incorrectly or poorly within society.

What I have noticed in my own life, and what I will be examining today, is our general under appreciation of what we have in life and how we approach what we consider success and happiness. From not having a nice car or house to being envious of what someone else’s family appears to be, has given society a poorly skewed view of what one needs to be happy. A man with a brand-new truck and a picture-perfect family can be miserable drowning in self inflicted debt while a felon with a questionable home and a twenty-year-old Buick can be enjoying a great life.

Now there’s really no set system to measure one’s success in life, but there are some signifiers of said success that I often think are weighed too heavily. I do believe the world is becoming more transparent and there has been a shift to enjoying life more over the last few years, but it can still be very difficult to ignore what social media tries to shove down our throats. A new car buys some time without a bill from the shop, while an old home that needs love will never cheat you of the pride it takes to really make it a home. Social media tells you to spend every hour at work so you can be a burnt-out depressed millionaire, while a person that runs a mile after work everyday may be happier than those who spend hours in the gym chasing a physique.

I have personally found having an old car without a loan instills something in you, it keeps you on your toes, it exercises your problem-solving skills, and there’s pride in fixing it when it inevitably breaks. It’s obviously not for everyone, thus the large amount of gray areas that make up human experience. I would truly get bored and even a bit lazy if I didn’t drive an older vehicle that needed my attention to maintain. That’s obviously just me though, no two people can really compare, there’s no formula or tailored path to what one needs to accomplish or pursue.

One of the largest issues that can make life far more difficult is our college system, we need doctors and engineers, but we also need steel workers and brick layers. When you’re in high school you get pushed to pick a profession and then college is just not for everyone. I don’t know if there is a good way to know as a teenager what you want to do with your life, most people don’t really loosen up and start figuring their lives out until they are in their 30s. It’s not the end of the world by any means but it can be a hard reality to face if you end up doing something you hate, especially when there was a time in your life that was all you wanted to do.

I find people who buy a van and travel the world or those who live in a cabin off grid incredibly interesting. They don’t own a lot, they have important tasks every day, and they struggle often but seem to always have a smile on their faces at the end of the day. Oddly enough that puts them at the opposite end of the spectrum, one we see daily on any given social media platform. Yet they still get just as much attention and interaction, almost as if there is something in our souls that yearns to be free, away from the stress of modern life and the pressure owning nice things can cause. One of my best friends is perfectly content renting an apartment living a minimalist lifestyle, and while I’m not working around the clock trying to buy a Ferrari, I do enjoy the things I own.

Unfortunately, with how expensive things have gotten I’ve found that people take far less pride in their jobs, myself included at times. I was standing at a gas station an hour ago, fueling up my car, and staring out over the lake as the snow came down around me. I had just gotten off work and was working up the ideas for this when I began thinking of all the shipyards, the men and women that worked them, producing the behemoths that haul ore, or transport people, ships that have been sent off to war as well. While the people putting those ships together had some terribly difficult jobs, I cannot imagine what it must have felt like to watch the launches knowing you made that. I think the pride we take in things we do, whether we want to do those things or not, is big part of having a happy life.

The mother scraping together enough money to feed her children or the man protecting his daughter from danger carries a happiness with it that cannot be replicated with a million followers or a nice car. You can be dead broke and be the happiest person alive and I don’t think enough people look at life half full often enough.