Reimagine the Good Life

[marmar]

Reimagine the Good Life
Measure your quality-of-life with Utne Reader's Commons Checklist

| by Jay Walljasper
Originally published in Utne Reader


Ah, the Good Life. Fine wine. Fast cars. Beautiful people. The beach house on St. Bart’s. The ski chalet in Switzerland. The apartment overlooking Central Park. The ranch in Montana. The castle atop . . .

Dream on!

For the overwhelming majority of us, living like this is about as likely as pitching for the Yankees. Our days are not spent on the beach or the ski slopes, but rather commuting to work, struggling with bills, and perhaps sensing that the best things in life are passing us by. It’s easy to feel small and drab compared to the millionaires and movie stars whose exploits are chronicled across the media. Making money—lots more money—comes to seem the only way to ensure a meaningful life, a point hammered home incessantly by advertising, financial experts, and political leaders.

This rising obsession with getting and spending has prodded authors John de Graaf, David Wann, and Thomas H. Naylor to observe that “a powerful virus has infected American society, threatening our wallets, our friendships, our families, our communities, and our environment. We call the virus ‘affluenza.’ “

They define this affliction as “a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety, and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more.” In their insightful soon-to-be-published book, Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic (Berrett-Koehler, $24.95), they report that in-creasing numbers of Americans are growing concerned about affluenza’s long-term symptoms—a view confirmed by the Merck Family Fund, whose national poll found that “there is a universal feeling in this nation that we’ve become too materialistic, too greedy, too self-absorbed, too selfish.” ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://onthecommons.org/magazine/reimagine-good-life#sthash.v4V0fY0x.dpuf

[enlightenment]

1. Is it ironic that

a study chronicling the horrible condition of "affluenza" amongst the little folk was funded by the Merck Family Fund . . . an organization that holds as one of its by-laws that the board of trustees will consist solely and exclusively of Merck family members? http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/funderprofile.asp?fndid=5386&category=79

There's nothing wrong with what this author wrote, beyond the utopian quality of the meanderings, but many of those "quality of life" checkmarks are as unreachable as great wealth for so many, especially now - twelve years after he wrote the article - that I have to wonder what prompted him to think it was a good thing to republish it.