The pressure to keep up with the Joneses
There has always been this great pressure to keep up with the Jones's and this problem has been around for many, many decades and I have often felt this pressure in my own life.
As an only child to parent that I would consider to be middle class and have a comfortable pension there is always this pressure to follow their lead whether we want to or not. The need to look good at all times and to feel like we fit in among their friends.
No matter what street you live in, no matter which country there is always that one family on your street that have it all and you feel like you must either match them or be better in every sense of the word.
Does the person up the street have a bigger television than me?
Who has the fastest or newest car?
Are my children the best behaved out of the local kids?
And so on...
This problem will never change but we have to learn it accept it because this is one of the main reasons why the majority of the world is heading out of a recession right now. We felt under such great pressure that we had to compete. So we ended up getting a loan so that we could buy that better car, have a second home and so on and before we knew it the banks were in trouble.
In life we have to learn that even if the Jones's at the top of the street have better things than us we have to work for these possessions and if we can't afford them we have to save. I have learnt to save money were I can so that I can have the nice things in life.
I will buy a lot of my goods from eBay as making this saving alone will allow me to spend extra money on my yearly holidays. It is a simple case of priorities and what means the most to you. In the world we live in there will always be someone better than us and we have to learn to live with it.
If you compete too much with the Jones's it will be your children and most importantly your family life that will suffer. Remember having a good life is always about enjoying what you have and appreciating that even if you are not keeping up with the Jones's there is always someone else in a worse position than ourselves.
As an only child to parent that I would consider to be middle class and have a comfortable pension there is always this pressure to follow their lead whether we want to or not. The need to look good at all times and to feel like we fit in among their friends.
No matter what street you live in, no matter which country there is always that one family on your street that have it all and you feel like you must either match them or be better in every sense of the word.
Does the person up the street have a bigger television than me?
Who has the fastest or newest car?
Are my children the best behaved out of the local kids?
And so on...
This problem will never change but we have to learn it accept it because this is one of the main reasons why the majority of the world is heading out of a recession right now. We felt under such great pressure that we had to compete. So we ended up getting a loan so that we could buy that better car, have a second home and so on and before we knew it the banks were in trouble.
In life we have to learn that even if the Jones's at the top of the street have better things than us we have to work for these possessions and if we can't afford them we have to save. I have learnt to save money were I can so that I can have the nice things in life.
I will buy a lot of my goods from eBay as making this saving alone will allow me to spend extra money on my yearly holidays. It is a simple case of priorities and what means the most to you. In the world we live in there will always be someone better than us and we have to learn to live with it.
If you compete too much with the Jones's it will be your children and most importantly your family life that will suffer. Remember having a good life is always about enjoying what you have and appreciating that even if you are not keeping up with the Jones's there is always someone else in a worse position than ourselves.