Sunday brought many things. It brought the long awaited calm after a busy work week and the chance to slow down and restock. In short, it brought rest. However, it also gave me time to read two articles that stuck out like sore thumbs from the weekend pile.
One article from the New York Times, In New Book, Professor Sees 'Mania' in U.S., echoed themes that I have seen in my work as an apartment therapist over the past four years. The doctor in question, Dr. Peter Whybrow speaks of "our compulsive drive for more" and how "we are making ourselves sick." Dr. Whybrow, the author of a new book, American Mania: When More Is Not Enough, is not just talking about a few of us. He is talking about all of us...
Just as we are experiencing an obesity epidemic in our bodies and a clutter epidemic in our homes, something bigger is out of balance. And while we feel good in short terms, a deep unhappiness has grown up in our country.
The problem is that we Americans have grown up to "favor individualism and novelty," creating a society that has been unstoppably "competitive, restless and driven to succeed. And we have succeeded." But we have lost something very important. We have created a huge socio-economic split whereby the rich are much richer and people are too busy to enjoy their prosperity, while we have also lost what ties us together in a "social context." We have lost the gratification that comes from loving each other as friends, neighbors and family.
This has made us anxious and depressed in record numbers.
When I work in homes I see this. I see good people who want to reconnect to their home and all that it stands for: reconnection to self, friends and family. I see people who are too busy to find the time. I see people who won't let go of stuff to get their home back. I see people who are depressed and need more help. I see regular people wanting simple things and struggling against the tide that runs past all of our doors.
In addition to the paper, our latest Forbes Magazine arrived over the weekend as well. Here is the cover story: "Billionaires - The World's Richest People (131 New Billionaires This Year!)." It was the perfect illustration of the hype and the reality that Dr. Whybrow is talking about (ps. One of the new billionaires is Martha.)
A few readers have conjectured on what Apartment Therapy stands for. Well here it is: AT stands for reconnecting and enjoying your own home....however you want to do it. It stands for simplicity and modesty, but it also stands for a bit of decadence as well. It stands for doing-it-yourself and working within a tight budget, but it also stands for hiring people to help you and splurging every now and then. AT stands for finding the balance between you as an individual and you as one connected to many, many others around you.
Finally, AT stands for not just talking, but doing something about it.
"A high tide washed all the little fish onto the beach where they were all gasping for breath. So here's this fellow scooping up each fish and throwing them back into the sea, and my friend goes up to this fellow an says: 'This is a fruitless task. It's not going to make any difference.' And the fellow picks up a fish, throws it into the sea and says, 'To this one it does.'"
Story told by Dr. Whybrow
MGR
I have thought a lot about this subject where the whole competitive nature of many aspects of life becomes so destructive that you can lose sight of what really makes you happy to the extent that you never really find true happiness. I think living in NYC exacerbates the problem because we are exposed every day to in your face examples of truly tremendous wealth, conspicuous consumption, the need to succeed, etc., such that you can so very easily get sucked into a world of comparisons and striving to maintain a certain image just to feel validated.
I believe that it is this comparison of ourselves to others is what really kills us. We have to unlearn that particular mode of thinking and I believe that it can be done. It may take a Eureka moment or months of trying things out of your particular (dis)comfort zone but to continue otherwise will never give us the happiness we are looking for.
I once had a conversation with a friend who most ppl would think of as very successful. She was a head of some commercial banking unit and her husband was an ibanker. I said that I believed one of the key tenants for finding happiness was managing expectations. That of yourself and of others. That way you would not disappoint others or yourself for any perceived failures. I was not advocating not dreaming big but did not explicitly say this. Her only response was that she saw plenty of dumb ppl who were not aware of their limitations get lucky by trying something and becoming rich. I don't know where wealth came into my point but I did not pursue it.
I read this article, and found it so interesting. I have been thinking about this topic a lot recently. I seriously do not have one friend in New York who is not on anti-depressants. (Don't get me wrong--I think they can be very valuable, but it's thought-provoking when everyone you know is on them.) One of my good friends is very successful, and has more than most people dream of, but she's terribly depressed and recently confided in me that the only thing that keeps her from killing herself at times is the thought that her sister would have to clean out her apartment. She also compares herself with everyone else, especially (weirdly) her old high school boyfriend who broke her heart--and she feels very irate when he is featured in our alumni journal, because he is also very successful. I really don't know what to make of it. I think Jaimiepup has a point that people have unrealistic expectations, and don't focus on what they HAVE done. Instead, everyone focuses on what they HAVEN'T done, and what they don't have.
Sorry, but there's a knee jerk reaction in me in regards to all this talk about happiness, working ourselves to death and 131 Billionaires.
The number of billionaires have grown because of tax breaks they don't have to carry and the rest of do. We work longer and harder just to keep up if not just to survive. We live in space-challenged apartments with overblown rents that we try to dress up to make them liveable and enjoyable while others enjoy second third and fourth homes.
Not criticizing or anything, it's just that I am really tired, trying to stay above water, and indeed, my home is the only place - my little slice of heaven - in this world that constantly seems to have everything stacked against me. And the independent individualism Americans seems to strive for is actually turning more and more into isolationism since holding on to the simple joys we are afforded to seem more and more fleeting if not taken from our graps.
Just a rant, sorry. Please ignore me.
A good online resource listing reasons why and specific actions to take to simplify your life is the New American Dream website (www.newamericandream.org) Besides promoting the benefits of gaining personal satisfaction with ones life, this site also emphasizes the environmental benefits of simplifying ones life. If you register, you can receive their free newsletter, In Balance.
The New American Dream website url listed above is incorrect.
It should read www.newdream.org
Sigh, I think JR Rice has a valid point. At the risk of this degenerating into a divisive political rant I've observed a lot in the press about the growing disparity between the richest and the average American as the value of "real" income declines, health and housing costs rise as a precentage of income, etc. Lowered expectations indeed. Still that doesn't deny the need to reconnect with the most basic values and pleasures of the hearth and home and try to do it with a little design flair.
Like those above, I read the review and have been thinking about these things for a long time.
Look, most Americans -- even very religious ones -- have internalized the values of our market-driven society. We live in -- and benefit from -- an economy based on buying stuff, most of which we don't need. The more we buy the less satisfaction we get(just as the first spoonful of a pint of Ben & Jerry's ice cream generally tastes better than the last if you eat it all in one sitting).
From disherwashing detergent to our political leaders, everything is presented to us as a choice in the "marketplace," and is heavily promoted by PR firms. If Olive Garden didn't advertise, how many people would eat there? Read Noam Chomsky's recent article "The Non-Election of 2004" to understand how far-reaching this PR thing is (go to Zmagsite.zmag.org or Google it). Sadly, if we don't buy things, then the US economy falls apart. And the reason it IS starting to fall apart (for middle class people at long last), is that nearly everything we buy is made someplace else, rather than here at home, and in an era of cheap oil, there's going to be more globalization, not less. But I digress....
We are marketed to 24/7, on TV, in magazines, websites, billboards -- even restaurant bathrooms. It's the only way to keep the system chugging along. If too many of us jumped off the boat, where would that leave our beleagured economy?
Of COURSE it's unfulfilling on a personal/spiritual level. All that junk we own ends up owning us. It should be paying us rent to occupy space in our overstuffed apartments! But paradoxically, many of us cling to this stuff because we've been taught -- and continue to be taught every time we watch TV or pick up a glossy magazine -- that this stuff represents security, success and happiness. It's the big LIE and more and more people are realizing it. But again, if we stopped buying, a LOT of people who end up unemployed and the stock market would collapse.
And you know, sometimes when I feel anxious -- and life can be extremely anxiety producing -- I sometimes buy something I don't need. It feels like I'm taking care of myself.
Happily, according to the law of thermodynamics, it can't go on forever. We have finite resources on this planet, though you'd never know it by reading anything that comes out of the mouth of our current administrations. When the gas runs out -- and it is -- we'll be burning all the stuff we bought just to keep ourselves warm....even the stuff from Design Within Reach.
funny you should mention forbes in the same post as the discussing the "why more is not enough" book . . . because in that issue of forbes is an article [at least partialy] refuting this idea . . .
the point of the forbes article was that while folks are unhappy when they choose amoung 30 rather than amoung 6, [because they fear it is more likely they havent made the "best" choice, given more choices, a perfectly rational idea it seems to me] . . .what folks really hate is NO choice
now this article was in the context of social security private accounts, but if you come down on the other side of the SS issue, try to ignore the motivation for the argument and just consider the experimental evidence
"i'm pro choice" from current issue of forbes-
". . . As the number of choices grows further, the negatives escalate until we become overloaded," writes psychologist Barry Schwartz in The Paradox of Choice, published last year. "At this point, choice no longer liberates, but debilitates. It might even be said to tyrannize." Schwartz misses the good old days when he didn't expect his jeans to fit perfectly and it took only five minutes to buy a new pair.
The book is a lucid overview of the psychological literature, and within its pages Schwartz, a professor at Swarthmore, sticks to personal advice. He urges readers not to fixate on finding the very best alternative but rather to set standards and accept the first choice that meets those criteria. The book makes no public policy recommendations. Since its publication, however, Schwartz has used his authority to opine against private Social Security accounts and for returning to steeply progressive income taxes, with a top rate of 90%. Neither policy is supported by the research he cites--or even by the idea that we'd be happier with fewer choices.
"Whether people are choosing jam in a grocery store or essay topics in a college class, the more options people have, the less likely they are to make a choice," he writes in an op-ed on Social Security. But the jam-and-essay study included a third experiment--the only one of the three that included a Social Security-style no-choice alternative--which he conveniently omits.
In that experiment, subjects were shown a group of Godiva chocolates. They were asked which chocolate they would buy for themselves, based on the name and look of each. Half chose from 6 chocolates and half chose from 30. Half of each group was then given the chocolate they'd picked. The other half got a different sample, selected by the experimenter.
People who picked from 6 chocolates were more satisfied than those who selected from 30. A bigger group seemed to make people more likely to worry that they hadn't picked the best chocolate.
But here's the Social Security angle- Subjects who ate a chocolate selected by the experimenter, rather than the one they'd picked, were much less satisfied than either group. Too much choice may cause regret, but no choice is worse. . . . "
Love the pint of Ben & Jerry's analogy, but I'm not ready to torch all the stuff at DWR yet. ;-)
Interesting subject - think my next comment is related in a very simplistic way - my niece does not enjoy this website because of the envy and nastiness it sometimes invokes - in other words, we should all be happy for what we have and not covet someone else's dream kitchen, bedroom, apartment, etc.
Social Security, I've always believed, is a baseline insurance program, to offer workers a base with which to create a retirement scheme for themselves. And to keep older Americans independent longer (in their own apartments!) and also to care for those who cannot care for themselves. It's a long running, successful program with small overhead and huge social and community benefit.
If you need more choice in your tax-free/deferred investment/retirement options then open an IRA/Roth IRA, etc. There are more than a few companies around to offer you choices for your investment income.
Adding huge new amounts to the deficit via the $3-5 trillion dollar price tag for privatized accounts will limit everyone's choices and lower all American's expectations in the future.
I've been thinking about this a little this morning, and it's become even more interesting to me. My friend's boyfriend is EXTREMELY rich, and they live in a huge house they have decorated together. My friend did a phenomenal job with the decorating, but she says her boyfriend says that whatever they buy has to be the best--and it is. Still, whatever they buy, he regrets. He got two antique lighting fixtures over an antique pool table, and now he feels that they should have gotten three lamps instead. His house is insanely gorgeous, and it seems like he, in some way, regrets every purchase. I can only think that maybe it IS from having too many choices.
On the other hand, I bought a $600 top on sale for $50 this weekend, and have been thinking of everything else I could have put that $50 towards. I'm not rich, but $50 is not exactly big money to me, so it's kind of interesting that I agonize that I could have better spent that money--on something more useful, or more unique, or more special. My husband says this is my one issue (maybe he just loves me and is reluctant to name all the others!)
Mike Pro - It DOES seem that simple doesn't it? Amazing.
Hmmm, I think Fiona and I are on the same page when it comes to what we believe is the level at which we can or cannot control our happiness. Conversely, I think Peter and TC are putting forth views examing the issue at similar levels to each other but at a different one to ours.
Having said that I see, or atleast agree with, TC's (or Barry Schwartz's) point more than I do Peter's.
Peter, I see where you're coming from but I'm not so sure that the problem is only about marketing and consumerism. I see nothing wrong in buying something that we desire (even if it is expensive and may be seen as profligate spending) as long as we don't believe that buying this thing validates us or makes us better than someone else (and as long as we can afford it). We can also gain as much lasting pleasure from buying something that is not expensive, as Fiona points out. I don't think that we need to stop being consumers at all. I think we need to stop comparing ourselves with other consumers and try to find happiness within ourselves, family and friends without having to stop buying "stuff".
Enjoy what you have, instead of coveting what you do not.
The Jonses don't really exist, except for the version the media has made for us to pit ourselves against. And if they did, they'd be thinking you looked better off then them. Don't worry about the Joneses. Be who you are by what you do with your time on Earth, not by what you think folks will think you are because of that expensive vase you just bought, thinking " I can't wait till the neighbors see THIS!"
Thank "Friends" for making us believe in large, many-roomed aparments on coffee jockey wages.
The thrill of a purchase is only temporary. A memory of a friend, an event, or a point in life lasts forever.
If you haven't used it in six months, recycle it/donate it/throw it out.
Slow down.
Don't believe everything you see on TV.
Find out where the spot is that you have "enough." That means you have survival covered, you are comfortable, and can even have a luxury experience now and then. Then, just stop. Don't try to surpass "enough." You will not find happiness there, but you will when you find the balance and no longer have to try to find it in gathering more and more and more...
One last thing on this topic. I know a man from the former Soviet Union. He said that, when he and his wife went to buy a baby stroller at Babies R Us, they couldn't handle all the choices and the pressure. He said "No one is happy here because they always think they make the wrong choice and are overwhelmed. In the USSR, no one was happy because there was no choice. People are happiest there are just enough choices." I think he's pretty right on.
Not to sound shallow, but just buying jeans nowdays is a major coolness test--right brand, right cut, right denim wash. It makes me tired, which may be a sign I need to accept that I'm no longer a 20-something!
I agree with JR Rice. I just have to look at my parents. My father was the postmaster and only employee of a post office so small that the government rented the bathroom from the feed store next door for him to use. My mother never worked. They raised 4 kids, we went on vacation together every year, we went to college & none of us left with loans and they own a couple of houses. My god. Just think how much money it takes today to have that kind of lifestyle? Even when you factor in all mom's coupons, the fact that they've never had a new car and that my father gets his tires from "his guy" at the dump, they raised a family on one income and Dad was home at 5pm every night.
rr I think what you and jrice are talking about is not really what the rest of us are talking about. Of course there's nothing wrong with this but I do think that the solutions to the problems that you two bring up are, on a logical level, more easily defined than the emotional and psychological stuff that the rest of us are talking about.
For example, where in the US was your father the postmaster? I would contend that there are still areas in the US that allows for the kind of lifestyle you grew up with. NY times once did a featuer on what a household income of $50K gets you around the country. A writer in NYC had made a lot of money in the dot com days and used it as a downpayment on a 1BR coop in the EV. Now that he and his wife had a baby they felt trapped on his post dot com meltdown income of $50K. Conversely a couple somewhere in Texas on the same income owned a large house, two trucks and bought just about anything they wanted. They felt that they had achieved all that they wanted to in life and felt failry wealthy.
NYC has always been expensive and unless you scored a rent controlled apt years ago (even rent stabilized apts are expensive compared to the rest of the country) then only the rich can afford the lifestyle that millions of other ppl enjoy in much cheaper areas of the country. A very different issue but still worth talking about.
America - stop exploiting mexican laborers by paying low wages to build your houses, stop exploiting the agricular labourer in latin countries so that you don't get cheap food ( cheap food creates obesity) stop making illegal workers to work in your restaurants. How many mexican workers work on curbside appeal - do you see a white face doing manual labor. How do you think the contractors pay them ?
the list is endless...
Every empire - rome and the british fell. They were prosperous some day and they fell because of arrogance, exploitiation, greed, selfishness, and manipulation and so will america - it will fall
Bell,
How sad that your off topic, pointless rant is the last entry here.