The take away here isn’t that these people we often see as fortunate- like the wealthy or the attractive- are full of sH*t- it is that we tend to take things for granted when we are used to them being there. Most people don’t stop each time they walk down a step on some stairs, pondering wether gravity will carry them to the next step or wether they’ll walk off into the air with the next step. Most people live a life where gravity is just there- they don’t really think about. They seldom seriously think about how their daily life would change without it, and they really can’t understand what a world without gravity would be like. They can read books and watch other people experience it- but that’s like saying giving birth hurts or getting kicked in the testicles hurts- you know it hurts and why or how- but you don’t really know what it is like unless you’ve lived it.
The truth is we all have gifts. Many people will say things like there is no such thing as privilege for a certain gender or a certain group, or that such things are blown out of proportion- a woman might say some like: “There isn’t wide spread work place discrimination against women, I’ve never experienced it…” that sounds pretty damning when a woman is telling you that- but she can’t tell you that. She can tell you that she hasn’t seen it- but having someone tell you that there isn’t discrimination because they haven’t seen it is like having someone who has never been kicked in the testicles tell you it doesn’t hurt- how would they know if they’ve never experienced it? All they know is they’ve never felt it, but if ten thousand other people who have experienced it say it hurts…. What’s that tell us…?
So we may have all sorts of gifts- even if we aren’t wealthy or considered attractive by most people, we can be funny, popular, athletic, smart, have SOME gift that other people don’t which has made or makes our life easier. We may think our parents or families are nothing special- wish we had this family or that family that was “better,” but someone else has a worse home situation and would be happy to have what we have- for them to hear is someone say: “man, my mom is the worst. She’s so strict and doesn’t let me date” or whatever- they might feel the way someone else feels when a person says money isn’t important-
Like they are listening to someone disconnected from reality that doesn’t realize how good their life is or how much of an advantage they have. So while it is annoying to hear these people say things like “money isn’t that important..” or to listen to someone who can afford to take a year off work and “find their passion” or whatever tell us that their $250k+ a year…
.. job just “wasn’t worth the money…” it’s also true most of us are guilty too and don’t realize it. One way to put it is that we tend to think the most important things are the ones we don’t have or have the least of. The value of water tends to be higher in the desert than where it is abundant. So I guess this is one place where we can all try to remember that most of us hate hearing this sort of thing, and don’t think much of the people saying them- so we probably should take the chance to be more introspective and appreciative of what we have so we can avoid sounding like this when we speak with others.
Like they are listening to someone disconnected from reality that doesn’t realize how good their life is or how much of an advantage they have. So while it is annoying to hear these people say things like “money isn’t that important..” or to listen to someone who can afford to take a year off work and “find their passion” or whatever tell us that their $250k+ a year…