Why I don't want to be successful...

It seems that our society is more stressed out, fearful and polarized than it ought to be.  Let’s be honest, there was no “good ol’ days.”  There was no time that was perfect or even that much better than our current time, but there was a time when it seems people appreciated the little things more and took more time to live.  Businesses used to be closed on Sundays, employers used to leave their employees alone at home and people were able to enjoy time away from work.  Today it seems that so many people are caught in jobs they do not enjoy with not enough time to create positive thriving relationships with those around them.  People are too busy and lose their perspective way too easily.  I know too many people who didn’t know quite what they were getting into when they accepted a job out of college and now they just can’t find a way to really do what they once wanted to. 

I see three main problems in America today.  First, many people are underemployed.  In other words, they take a job out of necessity that they are way over qualified for or can only find part time work when full time is desired.  Second, many people find jobs that pay an exorbitant amount of money and get trapped in a luxurious lifestyle that they can’t escape, despite their apathy toward their job.  Third, some people don’t care what the job is they just want a lot of money.  I know many who have to take a job to make ends meet, that’s not a bad thing, that’s a responsible thing, but when you chase a major in college or a particular career purely for the end of a high salary, that’s a problem. 

All three situations are all too prevalent in modern day America.  I would argue that these issues in our culture stem from 3 major problems in our society.

1.     The corporatization of our society.

2.     The love of money over people.

3.     Rugged individualism.

The corporatization of our society has occurred for several reasons, but the largest reason is that we are an incredibly consumeristic and materialistic society.  This comes from having a capitalist system that puts value on capital.  People implicitly start to value people based on what they’re worth or what they can do for them.  This has eroded the value we place on people intrinsically.  Furthermore, people used to have a blind trust in the government and while that has eroded due to Nixon and Vietnam, people have seemed to turn that blind trust over to corporations.  Consumers often turn a blind eye to who makes their products and under what conditions and focus on a cheap quality product rather than the ethics or morals behind it.  The markets reward corporations with investment without looking at how they provide for their employees.  Our society has turned away from government and social involvement and given our blind obedience to Nike, Starbucks, Gap and Apple.  The only positive in this is that some of these companies have been forced by a minority of consumers to think twice about how they treat their employees, give better benefits and support more altruistic charities. 

The love of money over people can be seen throughout our culture, in many “media” outlets, films, reality shows, certainly on Wall Street and even in too many Churches.  Much of this message is given to people, especially young kids, implicitly and skews our perspective in a way that puts value on things and not people.  In the inspiring book, “The Last Lecture” written by a cancer patient dying of cancer one of Randy Pausch’s dying lessons to his children was to value people over things.  Our culture emphasizes youth and vitality over wisdom and gravitas and therefore we see too much an emphasis on fashion, elective surgery and appearing a certain way.  All of these contribute to putting style over substance and this leads a society down a consumeristic road rather than one focused on those people within it.

Finally, rugged individualism.  Ayn Rand is one of the foremost philosophers on this, the irony is most Americans have never heard of her, but her cultural values are ingrained in our culture.  Study after study shows that amongst the developed nations of the Earth, America works the most hours, is least happy and has the smallest communal attitude.  In most of these studies there is a clear correlation between happiness, less work hours, more family time and a more communal society.  The Economist has run multiple articles on the new “science of happiness” and which countries are the happiest.  I, like many, am quite skeptical about scientifically determining happiness, but The Economists articles are quite convincing and well researched.  They find Scandinavian countries are the happiest and that the USA and ironically China are quite unhappy, despite China’s recent economic boom this has not correlated to happiness.  The problem being that as a society material success has been put ahead of leading a significant life that impacts others for the positive. 

In America today it is popular to make fun of Europeans, their governments and their lifestyle, but it seems to me they are light years ahead of our society that gives fewer holidays and no mandatory parental leave for new parents.  America is lacking on finding a work life balance and while the problems are clear to me, the solutions aren’t.  I laid out three problems above, but what sort of solutions are there?

To me the solutions are also threefold:

1.     Recreate our public education system from K-12.

2.     Emphasize living significant lives rather than successful lives.

3.     Stress a balance between individual rights and community goals. 

Within our education system we have all kinds of great schools and amazing teachers, but we also have unforgiveable inequality and complacency.  These are two major problems facing America today, but there is seeming little political or public will to change these.  First off, inequality.  Jonathon Kozol wrote an eye opening book entitled, Savage Inequalities, in 1991 where he pointed out cases of public schools within the same state that were quite different.  One school was dirty, worn down, crowded classrooms and ancient textbooks; while the other had state of the art technology, amazing cleanliness and plenty of room in class.  He wondered, as do I, how could this be in America today?  The answer of course is the way that we fund schools.  Typically it is done locally via property taxes, which sets up a grossly inequitable system.  The rich areas and neighborhoods have magnificent schools and the poor, well you get it.  We need to rethink the way that we fund schools, but also be willing to embrace dramatic new trends in education.  We have so many antiquated systems in our schools.  The way we grade, assign homework, have kids responding to bells, and more were set up for an agrarian and industrial society where children were either being prepared for the factory or the farm.  This is not the case anymore in modern America.  Our children need to be prepared for a small, global and highly technological world where quick and creative thinking will be valued.  Education funding and design must be rethought if America is to stay a world leader in the 21^st century.

All too often I believe we erroneously encourage our children to pursue success rather than leading significant lives.  This is not semantics.  Success is in pursuit of an individualistic or materialistic measureable goal.  The irony here is that the goal posts of success are always being moved by society and ourselves; therefore, it’s almost unattainable.  There’s never enough for a person driven by success.  There is always a faster car, bigger home or better job.  Significance on the other hand is totally about other people.  It is about using your gifts, talents and riches for the betterment of others.  You can do almost anything in a significant way in fact.  The point is not what you choose to major in or career path you choose, but it’s about why you have chosen that and what you intend to do.  People who chase success never find joy and contentment, but people who find significance are full of jubilation. 

Balance is key to these ideas truly taking hold in our country.  A balance needs to be struck between individual rights and truly valuing those in our community and country.  Our individual rights ought never be given up, but we also need to realize that I am not just an I, we are a we.  It’s not just about me, if it was the rest of you wouldn’t be here.  A fundamental assumption underlying all of this that is very difficult to refute is that we are social beings meant to live with one another.  Anything done alone is not nearly as sweet as sharing it with a loved family member or friend.  Therefore, we need to have value for each and every person and realize that not everyone is like me.  Our understanding of each other is critical for our society to continue this amazing experiment called America that no other people have ever endeavored upon.  America has always changed and will continue to evolve in time, but our society is all too angry, stressed, scared and polarized to keep this experiment alive. 

I think that being aware of the problems in our society is clearly first and foremost before we can solve them.  But every problem also comes with a solution.  They’re not always easy, but then again the things most worth anything in life aren’t easy.