Does Money Bring Happiness or Not?
Importance Of Money In Our Life
Many experts who examine economic developments say that sustained economic growth should not be a political goal, especially in developed countries.
For example, In a study conducted in Germany, The majority of the participants stated that they found the efforts to “think and plan for the future” exaggerated and that more attention should be given to the present and themselves.
This is because happiness and well-being are different concepts.
For example, the result of economic development and inventions in medical research provides a more prosperous society, but this does not have much effect on the happiness of individuals.
Happiness Measurement
This point brings to the minds of the readers how to measure such an abstract subject as happiness.
For example, typical questions in a study measuring happiness are:
• All things considered, how satisfied are you with your life these days?
• I believe that a good life awaits me in the future
• I trust the people I meet and approach them in a friendly way.
• I believe that when I get older, I will look younger than my age.
It has been observed that the answers given to such questions are consistent with people’s lifetimes and their friends’ evaluations of these people.
Positive self-evaluations are associated with behaviours that are seen as a sign of psychological health.
For example, those who say they are satisfied with themselves and their lives are most likely to be known as helpful people around them and show fewer signs of psychosomatic illness.
According to psychologists, what motivates people is not being happy, but being willing to engage in behaviours that will yield successful results in life.
For example, working for a promotion or being successful creates a relationship between “effort and reward”, so the person feels happy.
Meanwhile, the person goes to his job with love and says that he loves himself, his life and his job.
Life Satisfaction Score
As I mentioned above, people’s life satisfaction scores remain fairly constant throughout their lives.
While certain events occur, this satisfaction level makes dramatic changes in positive and negative ways, but after a while, individuals return to their own satisfaction level lines.
Events such as falling in love, getting married, and winning a big prize in the lottery carry this line upwards; Being abandoned, divorced, and being fired all dragged down.
However, people with high life satisfaction scores return to their pre-accident satisfaction levels by adapting to their new situation after a few months, even if they lose an important organ such as an arm and leg in a heavy traffic accident.
The first of the two extreme examples to be given on this subject is the book “Man’s Search for Meaning”, which tells how V. Frankl, who has entered the world literature, managed to live in an isolation camp during the Second World War.
The second is the film “Living is Beautiful”, which won an award for its director.
In this movie, the story of a father and son in an isolation camp is told.
It is based on the principle that the father shows all the practices in the camp to his son as a game.
The results obtained from these observations and studies reveal that social welfare cannot be based on individuals’ subjective perceptions of happiness and contentment.
People adapt rapidly to positive and negative new conditions, and they make a comment according to their attitudes that emerge in the extension of the motivational systems of their own brains.
On the other hand, those who say that the happiness of societies does not depend on economic development have an important approach.
Accordingly, the future of the planet we live on is at stake.
As a result of increasing prosperity, the increase in the emission of carbon and other toxic gases poses a threat to the Earth, but playing the violin which is another reflection of prosperity, does not pose such a threat.
This shows how versatile the subject is.
Of course, money does not directly bring happiness.
But having enough money makes life easier and gives us the comfort of having others do things we don’t like.
As one thinker said, “A problem that can be solved with a check is not a real problem”.
Money is a tool to make life easier and raise the standard. Happiness, on the other hand, is a perception shaped by having a positive attitude towards life.
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