In yesterday’s article, Does Money Buy You Happiness?, I discussed the relationship between money and happiness, and showed the happiness levels of different countries.
If you saw the table, you would have seen how the U.S., one of the richest countries in the world, is ranked 17th amongst countries in terms of the happiness quotient of its citizens.
It ranked behind a number of poorer countries, such as Columbia, Guatemala, and Mexico, and ranked even with El Salvador and Honduras.
The point of the article was not to say that money is bad. On the contrary, not having enough money can be stressful. And having a lot of money, or at least having enough, does have its benefits.
But, money can’t buy you true happiness. True happiness comes from a sense of fulfillment, of purpose, of following a dream, of feeding your soul, and of helping others.
Many times, when someone is materially successful, they say that what they did to achieve that success wasn’t done for the money, but instead was done for the love of their project, and that the money was secondary.
It is when the pursuit of money is the primary goal, at the exclusion of all other goals, that a person often loses their soul. Many a novel has been written and movie been made around that theme.
And so, for further evidence of this theme, I present 4 videos. At the top of the page is The Beatles, singing “Money Can’t Buy Me Love.”
And below are 3 more videos. First is the Talking Heads, singing “Once in a Lifetime.”
Then we have a video from ScienCentral News called “Money and Happiness,” in which researchers discuss new evidence that “American Dream” achievements like wealth, fame and image are not the keys to happiness.
And lastly, a video from MoneyWatch.com, entitled The Link Between Money and Happiness.
All of this is more fuel for the fire.
Again, having a lot of money isn’t an impediment to living a Low Density Lifestyle; it’s just if money consumes you to the point that it overtakes your thinking and undermines your ability to be truly happy, that’s when you’re deep in the High Density Lifestyle quagmire.
One last note: if you read our Summer Hours, you’ll know that for the summer we are publishing articles one less day a week, 4 days instead of our usual 5 days. So we’ll see you again with the next article on Tuesday.