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Money as a source of happiness
Money as a source of happiness
Can money make happiness essay
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Does Money Buy Happiness?
In today’s world, it is a prevailing truth that society often regards money as a ubiquitous element in daily life. As we are approaching a modern era, money seems to be getting more important and it has become a driving force of one’s life. The phrase “money may make the world around” perfectly portrays that our lives are constantly revolving around money. It is agreeable that money is not everything but with money, we can live the life the way we want and afford all the luxuries in life. The accumulation of wealth can fulfill our basic needs in life and can be used to acquire a lot of material things like branded bags and fancy cars. When money is so useful in every way, at the same time many might ponder, can money
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In Psychology Today, Carlin Flora clarifies that “happiness is more like satisfied or content than ‘happy’ in its strict busting-with-glee sense.” Carlin proposes that happiness is the feeling of satisfaction in life that will last long. “Happiness involves living a meaningful life, utilizing your gifts and your time, living with thought and purpose,” she added. In another word, true happiness comes from a positive and meaningful life that someone is fully gratified with. Therefore, when someone argues that money can buy happiness, he is trying to uphold that money can bring us long-term contentment in life, which is not always …show more content…
But have anyone ever wonder money might in turn bring you unhappiness? When we are consumed with money, we tend to forget what real happiness is. Money has diminished our ability to treasure the feeling of happy and contentment. Furthermore, it is fair to say it is a trade off between money and happiness. The opportunity cost is that you have to sacrifice happiness in order to gain more money. The fact that money can actually buy us unhappiness is proven in an experiment performed by Jordi Quoidbach, a psychologist from University of Liege in Belgium. 374 adults that are ranging from custodians to senior administrators are assigned to two random groups; one was shown a picture of a stack of money, another was shown with a blurred image. Then, they were given psychological tests to measure their ability to savor pleasant experiences. It turns out that people who had saw the image of the money scored a lower point. It is not surprising that psychological studies show wealthier people experience more negative emotions and suffer from a lot of psychological
Happiness is a feeling adults experience when they receive a gift, win something, and various other reasons, but does money buy this happiness everyone experiences? Don Peck and Ross Douthat claim money does buy happiness, but only to a point in their article which originally appeared in the Atlantic Monthly (252). Throughout their article, reasons on why money can sometimes buy happiness are explained. While some of the reasons given are effective, not all are satisfying answers for adults working diligently to make a living. Money is a part of everyone’s life, yet it is not always the cause of happiness.
According to Freud’s conclusion based on decades of experimentation and theoretical work in the field of psychotherapy, humans cannot be happy because a satisfaction of needs creates only a momentary phase of happiness which expires after some time. Therefore, the focus of life should not be obtaining happiness, and people should focus on avoiding suffering instead (Bullock, n.d.). However, several paradigms about well-being exist, and individual cognitive patterns and paradigms define the emotional responses to social influences. From an objective viewpoint, well-being is a state of consciousness that arises from a combination of internal and external factors, and money is an unstable external influence in defining subjective well-being.
In addition, money’s effect on an individual’s happiness will be examined, in particular the belief that more money will bring more happiness and how it is not as significant as individuals with less money being less happiness.
From the survey psychologists made, it seems that what makes us happy may not always bring more meaning, and vice versa. Feeling happy was strongly correlated with seeing life as easy, pleasant and free from difficult or troubling events, while none of these things were correlated with a greater sense of meaning. They also find that money is positively correlated with greater levels of happiness. However, having enough money seems to make little difference in life’s sense of meaning. Therefore, perhaps instead of saying that “Money doesn’t buy happiness,” we ought to say that “Money doesn’t buy meaning.” Additionally, in Baumeister’s study, “givers” reported higher levels of meaning in their lives compared to the “takers”. The researchers also point out
As money can be really important, alongside to food to eat, a house to live in, and places to go from here to there, but for all of those things, you need money. So that’s when “money can buy happiness” expression comes in because many people think that since money can buy everything they want in life, then it can easily buy happiness. My parents lived a decent life style, they had the amount of an average person in Amman Jordan. Meaning that we weren 't filthy rich, but we also weren 't poor either. The amount of money we had was enough to make us happy. We didn’t struggle with anything like food or other necessities we needed. My parents always say that "it’s better than nothing" because looking at others who don’t have much money makes me
Money and Happiness are two things that we have all given a lot thought. We put lots of effort into these two things either trying to earn them or trying to increase them. The connection we make between money and happiness is strange because they are two very different concepts. Money is tangible, you can quantify it, and know exactly how much of it you have at any given time. Happiness, on the other hand, is subjective, elusive, has different meanings for different people and despite the efforts of behavioral scientist and psychologist alike, there is no definitive way to measure happiness. In other word, counting happiness is much more difficult than counting dollar bills. How can we possibly make this connection? Well, money, specifically in large quantity, allows for the freedom to do and have anything you want. And in simplest term, happiness can be thought of as life satisfaction and enjoyment. So wouldn’t it make sense that the ability to do everything you desire, result in greater satisfaction with your life.
These three questions are asked on a daily basis: how much is enough, why are people willing to risk everything they possess just to get more money, and if money is so alluring, how is it that many wealthy people so distressed and unhappy? Many wealthy people, or just people in general, aren’t necessarily satisfied with what they have so they will do anything in their power to get more money. Nobody really understands why someone would be willing to lose everything they have just for something even more. People will always, under any circumstance, want more than they already have. They won’t be thankful that they have a house over their heads, clothes on their back, food to eat, and extra money to
It is highly debated, but ultimately incorrect. The closest correlation found on this topic was in a study conducted by Stanford, an Ivy League business school. With their findings, we can concur that the only way money can make someone truly happy, is by spending it in constructive ways to help others. With that, it is safe to say that if someone finds themselves unsatisfied with their live and wealth, that they could use it for the greater good. They should put it into charities, or as simple as buying a friend a meal. Whatever it may be, use the money for others. And that is really how money can buy
Money provides pleasure for humans, like houses, cars, or things people like in the term of toys. However, those material needs will bring temporary happiness. People can buy the newest toy they want, like iPhone. People feel pleasure when people the get the things they want. However, since it is a technology, other new things will be released and the pleasure from the precious toys will decrease. Telegraph, interviewed an Australian millionaire, Karl Rabeder, who was able to buy 3,455 sq ft villa which worth 1.4 million pound sterling. He was also able to buy 17 hectares farmhouse which worth 613,000 pound sterling in the market. He also collected six gliders, which valued at 350,000 pound sterling, and a luxury Audi A8, worth 44,000 pound sterling. He was also able to have a vacation to Hawaii and enjoy the five stars hotel he stayed at. However, he sold his entire asset and gave it all to charity in Central and Latin America. He realizes that money avoids the happiness to come. Now he feels lighter than ever. Many lottery winners also return their prize to charity. Once there was also an old Chinese man who won 4 million Yuan. The onl...
Money is probably one of the most important things in this world. Without it, life would be very hard. With it, you become economically stable making life would be easier in some ways. But the real question is, can money actually make someone physically and emotionally happy? There are many sides to this debate; some who say yes and others who say no. Though most people agree with the statement, “Money doesn’t buy happiness,” there is still a large amount of people who disagree with it. They believe that money does indeed buy happiness and that it’s the most important thing in the world. There is no right or wrong answer to this question, it’s just a matter of what you believe in and your values.
When none of us has ever come across such words and formulas, none of the great personalities has ever mentioned it, then who the hell has instilled it in our minds that money brings happiness. But among this debate one question still raises its head - What is happiness? Happiness is not actually leading a luxurious life but the luxury of living a life. Happiness is not actually about expanding your business, but it lies in expanding the horizons of life. Happiness is not having a meal in the most famous restaurant but to have it with your most beloved family. It does not lie in attending honorable parties but to attend a party with honor.
Now how does a person go about being happy, well let us examine one of the most common questions in reference to happiness, “can money buy happiness?” most people would say “yes.” The answer to this question will almost always be yes, because society and humans in general tend to be greedy creature always wanting more, from a better house to finer foods there is and always will be more to obtain. But is having these things what makes humans happy or is it the success of achieving your own...
Some have even suggested that this moderate connection might be exaggerated. In reality, money might have very little to do with happiness at all. Most puzzling, though, is that people often seem aware at some level that money won’t make them happy. And yet they continue to work away, earning money they don’t objectively need. First, though, let’s look at the three reasons money doesn’t make us happy.
I never really thought the expression, “money can’t buy happiness”, was true. As an infant, just by observing the people around me, I observed when they would obtain money and a huge grin would spread across their face, the corners of their smile spreading from ear to ear. Whenever I would see that grin and a person’s face light up at the sight of a crisp, green bill it would make me believe that I had proved the famous expression wrong. Now that I’ve grown up and matured, my idea of that expression has changed. As of now, I am able to reflect on life more and look deeper into things and particularly into people more than I was able to do years ago. My ideas about this expression changed the most though because of the money situation my family had stumbled upon because of the failing economy. I remember being younger when the economy was doing well and waking up to twenty gifts for each of my three sisters and I. We used to believe that all of those presents, brought in because of money of course, were the best part of waking up on Christmas. Of course all of those toys and material items would make a child happy; however looking back it would only make them happy if it was given to them by somebody who bought it for them with love.
Many people argue that money is not the key to happiness. However, have you ever seen a sad person riding a Ferrari? Or have you ever seen a man crying because he is too rich? In fact, I have no doubt that you've seen a man crying, because he is too poor. Money brings a lot of things to our lives. Money gives us what we want, gives the possibility toward a better future, and brings love and friendship as well. Therefore money is the ultimate key to happiness.