“It’s an “If you’ve got it, hide it” society because they don’t want to provoke envy in others. Americans are more individualistic and…flashier, I think.”

Isn’t that a materialistic mindset if you feel envious because someone has more toys than another? If material goods are less important in Europe, there wouldn’t be any envy. I heard that in Britain if you are rich or famous that you really DO have to hide from others. And that is a bit sad because humans should not be treated for what they have OR for what they don’t have. They should be treated with kindness regardless.

An obsession with the surface, the superficial – is one of the many things wrong with this world.

If relationships are better in Europe, then you shouldn’t have to boast, but you shouldn’t have to hide either. Envy is a sign of insecurity. It is a part of human nature, but in excess, it is unhealthy. Americans boast because they are insecure. The other extreme stems from insecurity as well. Both extremes are unhealthy.

Europeans may not boast about their toys or money, but they boast about other things. Americans may not hide their toys or money, but they hide other things. I loved this article, but I feel that we all need to respect one another’s cultures more. If it’s Brazil, we forgive them; it’s their culture. If it’s the US, it’s an outrage; they must change. However, I really DO feel that we all must lower our expectations in order to be happier.

Not all Americans or even most Americans are materialistic. But those who are – are that way because they’ve lost faith in humanity and are lonely. Toys cannot hurt you, they cannot insult you, make you feel bad about yourself, or reject you. Only people can. I am not this way, but many people are. It is a psychological problem that is pitiable and I empathize. If more people could have more compassion, this world would be more peaceful. An “us vs them” paradigm is the antithesis of that.

We don’t need to throw away our new car or buy one. We just need to be kind.

I often think a lot of American kids could do with a few weeks or a month or more of exposure to life in such places, living among the families instead of in hotels. They’d be a lot more thankful for the blessings they enjoy at home and maybe less likely to take it for granted and thinking that having much is the natural order of things.

I do think that traveling to a developing country can be one way that people in our state of mind can learn to change their expectations, I disgree with those who argue that our expectations cannot be changed. I help to run a volunteer opportunity in east Africa for Americans, and though I do see some who find the experience unpleasant and clearly can’t wait to get back to a life of ease, most find it eye-opening and – revelatory in a way, I can’t say relaxing or always pleasurable, but they see the challenge of living in a place where you have only intermittent access to things like water or electricity as a way of appreciating what they do have and getting off the hamster wheel to experience life where people do things like subsistence farming and storytelling and never worry about being on time or e-mail or phones.

Everyone there is overwhelmingly and unexplainably happy. In fact, I have to admit that at times I almost grew irritated with their happiness. I would be irritated that people were not serious enough, spending all their time giggling and laughing and not getting things done as I, the American wanted to do, quickly and efficiently. But I even found myself irritated with it on the most basic level: feeling like Ebenezer Scrooge at times, walking down the street and seeing everyone laughing away and thinking “what do they have to be so happy about? This place is a hotbed of poverty and death!”

I met people with AIDS who had a CD4 count of less than 10 (it’s a disease marker meaning that you have almost zero immune system function left) who were happy as clams, thanking God for their lives. I met orphans working as basically indentured servants in other people’s mud huts, sleeping on a mud floor, with no possessions to their names who seemed joyous and carefree. I don’t mean to say that they were unaware of their plight, they knew they were poor, they would say that they wanted things like televisions, but they just weren’t depressed about these things.

Anyway, I don’t claim to know exactly why the east Africans are so happy compared to Americans, but I would encourage anyone who is interested in resetting their expectations to consider a trip to experience life at the very bottom of the development pyramid, the real experience living with people and trying to understand their lives. You really come back ready to evaluate your own lifestyle. Even for me, I consider myself to be quite frugal (a plastic bag re-user etc.) and I came home thinking “oh, how I have fallen from the path on which I should be living, and what I should be valuing.”

It isn’t just parents who do this, schools do it as well, as do well meaning friends and others. They don’t mean anything bad in it, they’ve probably been similarly programmed and don’t know any other way.

I hear their voice in the back of my mind saying “when are you going to get a real job?” (i.e., a highly paid one), “you should have a house by now”, and calling me useless. It’s hard to balance what I want with what other people expect of me, and the only way to satisfy both is to increase what I have. So I guess my experience agrees with point (1) from #5: Oblivious Investor.

If materialism is an obstacle to happiness, I have to say that the Danes are not very materialistic so that might contrite to their happiness. Some of this is because taxes are high (25%) and prices are high. But Danes very much value vacations and family time, and not things.

But I also think that Danes have a lot of social support that takes away a lot of their worries. There are many money concerns that Danes don’t have: the social services infrastructure-you can’t go bankrupt from healthcare issues, inability to get into credit card debt (your credit card is attached to your bank account and if you don’t put a payment in full in the next month, the bank does it for you), and the way that automatic contributions are made to their pension without having to do a thing.

I do wonder if these kinds of social benefits would work for a country of 300 million like the US – Denmark is 5 million people.

Like you said, live and learn.

I have a high-paying IT job that I enjoy, and at least 25% of my money goes into savings and retirement. Being happy with what I have and not going into debt for stuff that I don’t need has given me great peace.

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To think about this from a different perspective:

Does anyone know what the Danish have done that was world-wide noteworthy or innovative in cultural, scientific, or literary circles in the past 10 years? 20? 50?

Go up to anyone on the street in the Western Hemisphere and ask that question. What kind of answers would an average joe say on the spot?

Probably nothing.

Now ask that question about the U.S.

The Internet
The Computer Revolution
Constant cultural innovation in music, the arts, etc.
Financial focus (the dollar is the standard currently)

Where does that come from? It’s our culture and the constant striving and “discontent” that is built in.

You have to take the bad with the good. If we ripped out the “discontent” we pretty much become a bunch of lotus-eaters, as an extreme example.

Happy, yes.

An Effective, innovating, striving culture. Maybe not.

I too was very materialistic five years ago. In fact, my past life (i.e. career, marriage, hobbies) was based on it. I was on my fifth Lexus and I wasn’t any happier. It’s funny how I look back on those days and it doesn’t seem like the same person. For anyone reading who is pursuing happiness through things, you really should look at changing your focus. I can tell you from experience that being “on the other side” is SO MUCH BETTER. I like the 1980′s lyric from Don Henley – “There ain’t no hearses with luggage racks”.

On the subject of becoming less materialistic, I certainly think it’s possible. I think materialism is something we learn from our environment, it’s not at all like being born homosexual or heterosexual.

I think I was materialistic (though I think most of us are and always will be, to some degree) because I didn’t know any better. But when I started to question it, I began to reject it more and more. People can change their degree of materialism…my monthly expenditures now compared with five years ago is proof of that!

Maybe those who pursue their own course are happier because they’ve granted themselves permission to do so. That may not produce a perfect life, but it will produce one filled with purpose, which can bring more happiness than money in many cases.

Chris is discussing rich clients, those who pursued their passions and crossed the goal line, but there are also people out there (and no small number!) who have taken a similar path and haven’t hit on the monetary rewards.

I’m still not certain why some people achieve this and others don’t, but it does appear that the journey itself seems to produce some level of happiness no matter where it lands. Perhaps it’s because a person pursuing his own path isn’t owned by anyone.

That would be an interesting thread by itself…

I worked with very Rich people and the biggest difference I saw was their Focus on Money – how to make it, educating themselves and taking responsibility for their choices so they had a firm foundation to make correct decisions no matter what The Market was doing.

Others sought short term compensation and very much needed approval of others (affirmation). Life is an evolution; an ongoing growth of ideas and actions toward a fullness and appreciation of the Now.
I also saw that when one operates from Fear they usually are not as “happy or successful” because the stars-don’t-align.

Find out what you Love to do, research areas of employment/business and work toward that Goal. May I suggest reading Warren Buffet’s biography and or life story. Lot’s of Money, Simplicity, Self-education at early age (teens), and Friends and Fun!

Off to “work” now…
Enjoy the Day.

A doubling of household income would certainly make me happy — but that would be because I found a husband. Right now, I think good relationships would greatly add to my happiness more than increased income, and this is going to affect my finances this fall. (Second job or join a club or sport? hmmmm…)

Btw, there isn’t any northern european country called “switzerland” – the country I think they are meaning is S w e d e n.

/a swede ( no, we haven’t got any polar bears on the streets either… )

If you dream big, you gain big. There is absolutely no doubt about it. You may be happier with lowered expectations, but you will only manifest what you expect.

Adam.

Having money takes out one of the Top 3 stresses people have.

Hence why I’m striving to reach financial independence by 40, but still work. Nothing beats working when you don’t have to work!

Best,

RB

-Mike S.

I used to think that if something cost more, it was better. I would spend more money on less stuff, and be disappointed.
Now, I know that the value of things doesn’t depend on how much they cost. I find cheaper options that make me happier, and I feel good about making smart choices, when I used to feel terrible about wasting my money.

Now, when I do spend a lot, I do so with a good (or at least, better than I used to) reason, and that makes me happier too.

I do think it’s good to be satisfied with what you have. Thinking you can be a millionaire, and wanting it all right now, won’t make you very happy. But if you take small steps, you might very well become wealthy.

I think the problem is people wanting to have their cake and eat it. People want it all without having to work for it.
Once you realise working for things is more satisfying, that problem is solved.

Canada is #89 — up from #111 in 2006.

Our less-than-stellar environmental record must be dinging us in this survey. We do well in other ones!

I wonder if it’s because we defy the pattern? In previous years, Canada has ranked among the top 10 for happiness. (I believe those surveys were based on OECD statistics, this new organization also factors in the environment so it’s a bit different).

The “Happy Planet Index” website had been down all day. Boo!

I think it is due to the weather. if you look at the first 50 countries on the Happy Planet Index, around 47 of them are located entirely between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn. But if you look at the top 50 highest GDP per capita countries, they are ALL located outside the tropics.

It is intuitively obvious to me that folks living in a place where it is sunny, warm, and green for 365 days out of the year will be happier than people in places where it is overcast, cold, and grey for a big portion of the year. As it turns out global wealth is centered entirely in countries with horrible weather (i.e. North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia). And we piss away much of that wealth trying to artificially recreate the climate which all of the happy countries have naturally and for free.

My guess is that the expectation of a better life is probably universal. The problem here in America is that our expectation of a better life probably incorporates a few too many expensive bells and whistles–and those are the things we’re stressing over. It’s evidenced in the fact that we take on more debt than other cultures.

Our optimism may drive us to want for better things, but it won’t pay the bills for them. Maybe the Europeans, being older cultures, have that figured out already.