
The comfortable life is killing us - arbhassan
https://medium.com/@erikrittenberry/the-comfortable-life-is-killing-you-61cae61622e7
======
pascalxus
> "most prosperous time in history" That is no longer true, at least not here
> in the US. the most recent adult generation is now the 2nd or 3rd most
> prosperous generation and not by such a large margin as everyone thinks. The
> thinking goes that since GDP per capita is up and productivity is high, that
> we are much wealthier but it's not true.

Even GDP per capita adjusted for PPP can't adequately measure wealth because
it uses the wrong basket of goods. if you have a million dollars and you can
afford 1000 iphones but a house costs 5 million, then your not wealthy.

Wealth is being able to afford the basics of life: Shelter, food and water and
by extension: transportation (because you need to get to a job), education
(because employers now require it, regardless of whether its useful), and
medical insurance because you don't want to loose your shelter.

Those 6 things are just as expensive as ever, if not more expensive than ever
and the average person is less able to afford them, at least in the coastal
cities. Calculate how many hours of work per week it takes to afford shelter.
people work longer hours than ever, and nearly 50% of their salary now goes
just towards shelter which equates to 20 to 25 hours a week of work just to
afford shelter. Was that the case 500 years ago?

Yes we've come a long way from 500 years ago, undoubedly we can afford much
more food with much greater variety than ever. we eat like kings, dress like
kings. But, still live in shelters we can barely afford.

~~~
cdoxsey
And the richest person in the world 30 years ago couldn't afford a single
iPhone because it didn't exist.

Shelter 500 years ago was barely better than a single-room, unheated hut. And
you probably didn't even own it. You were a serf beholden to a feudal lord.
(And that feudal lord didn't even have air conditioning)

And your food was whatever you could grow. In a good year maybe you made a
little more than you needed. In a bad year you starved to death.

Even the bottom 1% in the US today have access to far better healthcare than
the richest 1% 150 years ago. Antibiotics didn't even exist.

All 6 of the things you mentioned are far better off for almost anyone living
today.

Also maybe wages have stagnanted in the US for this generation, but keep in
mind the wealth improvements in the rest of the world have been staggering.
Billions of people in India or China have been lifted out of poverty.

Focusing on the plight of college educated, middle class young adults seems
pretty bizarre when compared with the far greater suffering of so many.

Sure strive to make things better... But if your worst trouble in life is
having to work 20 hours a week to live in a comfortable apartment in the most
expensive and exclusive city in the country... I'd say things were going
pretty well for you.

~~~
pariahHN
> Also maybe wages have stagnanted in the US for this generation, but keep in
> mind the wealth improvements in the rest of the world have been staggering.
> Billions of people in India or China have been lifted out of poverty.

So, your premise here seems to be that even though your own life may be going
downhill as long as everyone else is doing better you shouldn't bother with
exploring the reasons behind or even trying to fix your own backwards slide.
Is that correct?

~~~
cdoxsey
It's about keeping things in perspective. Sure explore the reasons or try to
fix the backward slide, but maybe we should have a basic posture of gratitude.
I suspect most of us have it pretty good in life.

Also the consequences for policies are not always easy to predict. As an
example, making college free seems great for the children of the upper middle
class. But what about the majority of people who don't go to college?

~~~
pariahHN
Every time I see someone bring up that others have it worse, everyone else has
seen huge improvement, etc I've always gotten the impression that they are
somehow trying to minimize the issues people are talking about as not being
worthy of consideration because of the other. From your reply it seems like I
may be missing something because I can't see how anyone's level of gratitude
or acknowledgement/lack of acknowledgement re the improving status of others
is relevant to the concerns they have regarding their own situation or
productive in resolving said concerns. And thus, I usually conclude that the
only reason it is brought up is to minimize whatever issue the original poster
brings up.

But I'm really curious as to what the underlying reasoning here is. I can sort
of understand when it comes down to obvious luxuries, so long as those
luxuries are not in fact mandatory for being a productive member of the
corresponding society (eg complaining about not being one of the 100 people to
have one of those newfangled telephones vs complaining about not having a
telephone in an age where having a telephone is the default expectation).

How would having a basic posture of gratitude aid someone in resolving issues
they face that deal with what may be seen as luxuries in areas that are
improving but which may be necessities in their own area? What relevance does
the improvement of others have to resolving or mitigating the backwards slide
of another? Is it not better for _everyone_ to be experiencing improvement? Is
there some fundamental mechanism that requires some areas backslide in order
for others to improve?

I'm genuinely curious - you aren't the first person I have met that makes the
assertions you have, and I have experienced the same sense of bafflement every
time.

------
cousin_it
I read a nice explanation on LW. Imagine you need goods X and Y to live well.
And imagine that in the ancestral environment, X usually came with Y. So
evolution could get away with giving you the drive for X, but no drive for Y
(though lack of Y would still make you suffer).

Now switch to modernity, where goods can be obtained more independently. For
example, you can get tasty food (X) without some necessary nutrient (Y). So
you end up suffering for lack of Y, but your drive is only for X. Moreover, as
the market tries to provide X cheaply, it has an incentive to drop Y. I don't
know how many such Y's we're missing now, but probably a lot.

~~~
charliemil4
Forgive me, what’s LW?

~~~
syrrim
lesswrong, if I had to guess

------
closeparen
I spent the first part of my life pursuing what was interesting and engaging
to me for its own sake, not putting much effort into status signaling or a
cultural mask. All I got was crushing loneliness and a severe social skills
deficit. 0/10 do not recommend.

~~~
existencebox
I spent the first part of my life pursuing an impeccably planned career
trajectory, setting myself up with all the markers of status and culture that
my peers and family expected, discarding the things I loved because they did
not contribute back to that.

All I got was crushing existential depression and a severe social skills
deficit. 0/10 do not recommend.

I realize this is a glib comment, please don't take it as an insult, just the
tongue-in-cheek response of someone who felt a surprisingly mirrored
experience of yours.

In fewer words, I'm not sure anecdata is not going to help in this case, but
if someone is feeling "something missing" in their life, some of the avenues
of questioning and introspection presented in the article may be useful.

~~~
imgabe
It seems like the common factor is isolation and loneliness. I don't see why
chasing either status or what you love has to necessarily entail isolating
yourself from other people and letting social skills deteriorate. Either path
could be pursued with others, and indeed would probably be helped by having
friends and allies along the way.

~~~
closeparen
The problem is obscure preferences. Maybe 30% of the time there's someone in
my world who shares them, and maybe 10% of the time we're friends. Having a
community usually requires openness to activities that would not have been my
first choice, or my tenth. I never used to make that trade. It's worth it,
though.

------
DubiousPusher
> Just take a gander at Twitter or at the comment section of a political
> article and you’ll see just how violently enraged we’ve become.

Ahistorical nonsense. Ever since the vast majority of humans have become
politically aware political violence has been a fact of life. Repression,
revolution, purges, terror, assassinations, progroms, riots, barroom brawls,
slander, muckraking, bribery, insightment are a constant fact of the modern
and pre-modern world.

Before there was such a thing as popular political awareness the nobel classes
engaged in all the same in their own way.

Since the 70s, America and Europe have enjoyed and continue to enjoy one of
the least politically violent stretches in world history all the while
carrying on an inflammatory and sometimes vial discourse. If you find the
current rhetoric jarring it's probably because you lived in an enclave which
was protected or benefited by the hegemony of the white professional class and
so had no reason to be exposed to the anger and violent language that often
accompanies the desperate demand for change.

~~~
crooked-v
Some simple examples of that last point:

The Tulsa massacre in 1921, where a single mistaken claim of assault by a
black teenager led to massive mob violence against the city's black community
complete with private planes dropping homemade incendiaries on black
neighborhoods. Estimates are that at upwards of 100 black people were killed
and more than 10,000 were left homeless. More than 6,000 black people were
arrested, but no action was ever taken against the whites who took part.

The zoot suit riots in Los Angeles in 1943, where mobs of thousands of
American military servicemen and local white residents sought out, assaulted,
and stripped every Hispanic they could find (as well as the occasional black
person). More than 150 people were beaten. Police joined in on said beatings,
and then arrested more than 500 of those same people who had been targeted by
them, for 'vagrancy' and 'rioting'.

The Kent State killings of 1970, where the Ohio National Guard
indiscriminately fired on a crowd of protesting college students, murdering
four and injuring nine, and the Jackson State killings ten days later, where
city and state police fired on student protestors, murdering two and injuring
twelve. No criminal prosecution was ever taken against the people who did the
actual killing or the leadership involved in either case.

~~~
sizzle
Didn't know about those last college incidents, thanks for sharing.

------
pmlnr
The more comfortable life gets, the more knowledge people will receive. The
more time they have, the more they think. If you combine these two, it's
inevitable to start asking questions about your own existence. Because there
are no logical answers to that, people retreat.

That's why you have so many depressed people. They might not know it though.

To move on, we, as society, will need to grow and change. When there's no need
to fight for everyday survival - shelter, warmth, water, food- , we'll be free
for the first time in the history of our species. That's when it gets
interesting.

------
strken
The answer to feeling disconnected and alienated from the world is not to
disconnect further or to embrace the alienation. It's to call your parents and
tell them you love them and ask about their week, to message your friends and
ask when they're free next week, to learn the name of the cashier you always
see at the supermarket, to volunteer to help fix whatever problems you worry
about, and in general to build genuine connections with other people.

Investing money in experiences instead of goods is less important than
investing time in others instead of isolated activities.

~~~
pixl97
Hello, modern commercial advertising here. No, don't invest in people, invest
in yourself, in fact we have the perfect product to sell you to do just that.

It is going to take a major change in modern lifestyles to force advertisers
not to sell us lies. It seems every screen is selling is separation.

------
watwut
The modern life is horrible to mental health articles that ignore alcoholism
and violence and social problems of the past are always suspect.

Yes, some kids are on psychiatric drugs that should not and we don't have
tolerance for kids that don't do well in early academic. But we also don't
beat the shit oit of them when they misbehave, so it is not all just bad.

------
jokoon
"embrace your suffering"

Sorry but I don't understand this.

The whole "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" meme is meaningless.
Challenging one self to get pain and pretend you will feel better after is a
pointless way to live life.

There is little point in climbing mount Everest. It's good for your health to
practice physical activity and to occupy your mind and time. But this constant
idea that we have to challenge ourselves, while we can't manage to fight
inequality or climate change, shows that we're deluded.

Climate change will be the new equalizer. The right to emit co2 will be the
new currency.

~~~
DaiPlusPlus
> The right to emit co2 will be the new currency.

Well yes, that's exactly how cap-and-trade and carbon-credits work.

~~~
throwaway100773
Not in the us it doesn’t. The two cap and trade programs in the us do little
to stop someone at the individual level from needlessly emitting - there is no
economic signal to stop. Even some large emitters aren’t subject to any
economic signals in rggi, and California has an odd habit of handing out
allowances. In a more perfect world, you would be correct.

------
allovernow
>Carl Jung, one of the most prolific psychotherapists of the 20th century,
remarked that about a third of his cases were suffering from “no clinically
definable neurosis, but from the senselessness and emptiness of their lives.
This can be defined as the general neurosis of our times.”

I don't agree with his methods, but the Unabomber was a brilliant
mathematician (and, incidentally, a victim of the MK Ultra experiments) and
wrote on this subject in his manifesto. He observed that our modern lives are
far removed from the hunting/gathering of our ancestors. We evolved to seek
frequent small stimuli - hunting for mushrooms, picking fruit, occasionally
chasing down an animal - and the rewards tended to be immediate and tangible.
Now most humans spend all day working in one specialization with intangible
rewards that come in the form of payment every few weeks. It's much harder for
most humans to find natural meaning in these tasks, and they don't typically
feel critical to survival because, well, we really are quite comfortable most
of the time!

------
vkaku
No, a life that kills you is not comfortable.

An American life values money over ease of living though, as rightly pointed
out in the article. But it's definitely not something to say to one who will
view it unfavourably.

Putting people under constant adversity does not make them do better: Only
happens if that adversity teaches them something.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Enough struggle encourages growth, too much struggle kills.

------
rusabd
It is much simpler than this. Humans are social animals, we need upto 1000
close family members. Not friends, not colleagues, not church members -
relatives. They should be really close, like you should see them almost every
day. If you don't you develop unhealthy relationships with people who really
don't care about you much. And this means you are alone in this world and you
must be stressed - something is going to happen and nobody is going to help.
This is natural reaction to an abnormal situation.

~~~
rak00n
I hear you but in this situation what else can be done other than marching
forward with self reliance and accepting the circumstances?

~~~
rusabd
I accept that I cannot fix it for myself, but I am trying to make it easier
for my children. Hopefully, they will have enough resources to fix it for
their children.

------
davidjnelson
It’s a nice piece on breaking out of the conditioning of society and
gratefully embracing our time on earth by living fully and taking risks.

Some nice quotes from wise people:

> But as Alan Watts once reminded us, “This is the real secret of life — to be
> completely engaged with what you are doing in the here and now. And instead
> of calling it work, realize it is play.”

> In the words of Henry Miller, “the aim of life is to live, and to live means
> to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.”

> “If you’re going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like
> that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire.
> DO IT. DO IT. DO IT. All the way You will ride life straight to perfect
> laughter. It’s the only good fight there is.” - Charles Bukowski

------
TACIXAT
I feel very much the same way. Working in an office is incredibly dull,
society feels incredibly dull.

I romanticise primitive life, and people often rebut that you would die at 30.
I would be ok with that though, trading some amount of life expectancy for
increased excitement, purpose, and struggle. I do this in some ways through
moderately dangerous activities, off roading (moto and Jeep) and snowboarding.

I do not think the incredibly comfortable and coddled bay area corporate life
is for me. It is another matter to figure out what is, and what will be
sustainable.

~~~
WalterBright
> die at 30. I would be ok with that

Speaking as someone considerably older than that, I bet you change your mind
on your 30th birthday.

~~~
TACIXAT
I'll take that bet. I'm past 30. What did I win?

~~~
WalterBright
> What did I win?

Life after 30.

------
spicymaki
It is harder to blame others for my failings if I have total freedom and
opportunity. This forces me to direct anger towards myself.

With imposed constraints I could at least make myself content with my
situation as it is. This is probably why monastic life appeals to certain
people.

------
jdkee
". . . Rollo May, defined it more accurately — “Depression is the inability to
construct a future.”"

That is especially true in the era of inaction/regression on climate change.

[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/01/out-
on-i...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/01/out-on-its-own-
australia-the-only-country-to-use-climate-funding-to-upgrade-coal-fired-
plants)

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/18/business/energy-
environme...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/18/business/energy-
environment/nuclear-power-westinghouse-toshiba.html)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/03/climate/japan-coal-
fukush...](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/03/climate/japan-coal-
fukushima.html)

[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-13/germany-s...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-13/germany-
s-farewell-to-coal-complicated-by-new-uniper-plant)

------
devnullbyte
This is why I run ultra marathons, often in the mountains in incredibly bad
weather. Well I should rephrase this, I run the first 20-40 miles, the rest is
a hike, until the last ten of so miles which are a zombie shuffle. The thing
is though, I spend hours just on my own (most of the time), with only my own
wits to keep me going and entertained. I also get to side up real close to
nature at it's rawest.

------
card-io
Things that helped me the most: cardio, diet. It's hard to escape biology and
I don't know who said it (probably hardmaru retweet) but the brain is a motion
co-processor so general movement goes a long way towards maintaining a healthy
mind. It won't fix all your problems but it costs nothing other than some
willpower and a trail you like in your local neighborhood.

~~~
WalterBright
For me it takes no willpower at all to go out for a walk. It does take a lot
of willpower to sit in a comfy chair and do nothing.

I once went on vacation to a beach resort. I went out to the beach all set to
spend time sunning and sitting, like they do in the movies.

That lasted less than 5 minutes.

~~~
card-io
You make a good point. Even walking goes a long way for mental well being.

~~~
WalterBright
Every day I can go for a walk is a beautiful day.

------
briandear
> Depression rates have been steadily rising in the US since the mid-1930s.

Are we accepting that as true? Is not our awareness of depression greater? How
was depression among those in a small town reported back then? Was depression
even a “thing” in common knowledge then? All the sudden everyone seems to have
a gluten problem — a problem that, while real for a select few, is mostly a
manufactured fad. Did human biology actually change that much, or are we just
getting more messages that make us notice or perceive more? When the media
says everything is a nail, we start to buy more hammers.

------
jcjray
I see mention of neither crippling medical debt nor the inevitable societal
problems caused by widespread ignoring of the climate emergency. There is
little comfortable about seeing the world as it is as an American.

------
neuralRiot
People forget that the harder is to do something the higher the satisfaction
when you do it right. Life is a journey not a destination, death is the
destination of life.

~~~
WalterBright
Yup. Once you achieve a goal, spend a few minutes celebrating, then on to the
next goal.

------
Animats
There may be a survivor bias here.

------
FrozenVoid
Its not the comfort, its polluted environment and economic burdens. No one has
died from too much comfort. The article feels like another out-of-touch rich
person harping on about that "money can't buy happiness".

------
zweep
A much better piece of writing on this topic is “Industrial Society and its
Future,” also known as the Unabomber’s Manifesto. You have to forget who wrote
it and also ignore the worst 20% of it to get the most out of it though.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
I can't forget who wrote it. I can't forget taking my computer in to get it
repaired, and how much pain the repairman was in. A month or two earlier he
had picked up a package left by the Unabomber. I can't forget what the
Unabomber's ideas led him to do. I've _seen_ the results of his ideas, written
in pain on a man's face. I can't forget.

~~~
zweep
The way I recommend reading it is, there is something in those ideas that you
can act on, in a constructive way, in your own life, without hurting anyone.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
But where do you draw the line? I'm not going to read _Mein Kampf_ looking for
constructive ideas. Why? Because Hitler's position is so _de_ structive that
trying to untangle constructive ideas from the destructive seems like a fool's
errand. (Also dangerous - I don't want to miss some of the destructiveness and
incorporate it into my thinking.)

So the question is, did the Unabomber have good ideas, but follow them to bad
conclusions? Or is the destructiveness more pervasive in his writing?

For me, the destructiveness was too vivid and too personal.

------
RestAndVest
I had troubles understanding the article. The very first point is: Let Go
Americans are among the most stressed people in the world. Eighty-five percent
of workers worldwide....

So, how can you have a comfortable life and have a job that you hate?

~~~
TACIXAT
I had an incredibly comfortable life working at Google while hating my job. I
was making excessive amounts of money, they provided food, job was incredibly
relaxed, pretty much there were no worries in life.

On the other hand, I felt like I was going insane because I couldn't stand it.
I was working on a web application. I'm a security engineer with a passion for
low level code. Web work and the Google code bureaucracy (read: mature
software development practices) were so frustratingly dull.

That is how your life can be comfortable while having a job that you hate. I
now work part time remotely (not for Google). I go on trips as often as I can.
I'm working on work that I'm engaged by. I am making less money, but life is
tolerable.

~~~
WalterBright
I make $0.00 working on the D compiler, but it is very fulfilling.

~~~
Ididntdothis
I assume you have enough income from other sources which gives you the
freedom.

------
LouisSayers
Over the past year and a half I've had some personal insights into my own
personal happiness. I would agree that for me at least some modern day
comforts tend to dull me down rather than fire me up. Here's a personal
experiences:

\- Netflix and TV - I really love watching movies,and series. I've binge
watched a crazy amount of Netflix TV series. At my worst I'd stay up until 3am
on a binge, and would sometimes combine this with drinking whiskey. Doing so
would interfere with my sleep, the alcohol would affect my mood within the
next few days, and of course living this way means I'm not spending time on
more productive or worthwhile activities.

These days I hardly ever watch TV, and instead of watching movies at home I
like to go to the movies instead. It's much more enjoyable and makes watching
movies feel more special.

\- Coffee - I tend to think of coffee as the equivalent of little kids
drinking hot milk - except we're adults now and our hot milk has been combined
with coffee. One thing I noticed drinking coffee is that the caffeine
increased my general anxiety levels. Another thing I've noticed is that
consuming lots of dairy products makes me feel a bit sick and yuck afterwards.
So I switched to a combination of herbal tea and sometimes have decaf coffee -
I did get some headaches after I did this, so would recommend slowly weaning
yourself off caffeine rather than going cold turkey.

\- Food in General - A lot of food these day is made for convenience. Cereals,
bread, high in sugar products etc. I've slowly been getting a more nutritious
diet and cooking a lot more. As mentioned with coffee, milk makes me feel a
bit sick after so I don't buy any kinds of milk anymore. Sugar is something
I'm still working on and is super addictive (also non-dairy milk usually has
~10% sugar in it!), so I'm working on weaning myself off that as well. I find
that having a better diet has allowed me to recognize more easily what foods
make me feel yuck. I believe diet is huge in affecting how you feel.

\- Exercise - Intense exercise makes you feel sick when you first start doing
it, but over time the sick feeling goes away and it can lead to a much
healthier lifestyle and feeling better about yourself. If I eat something bad
or drink alcohol on a Friday, during my intense Saturday workout I know
instantly what I did wrong. Creating a routine out of this has helped change
my behavior because on a Friday I will intentionally not do certain things in
order to avoid the sick feeling on the Saturday. Not comfortable at all, but
totally worth it.

\- Sleep - I've been working on getting to bed much earlier (around 9-9:30pm).
It's a work in progress but I feel much better for it.

\- Following your Dreams - Over the past year I've sacrificed a cushy salary
and tried new things to support my dream of being a successful entrepreneur. I
spent thousands of dollars on courses, and had a crack at phone sales. It
hasn't always been easy, but I'm proud of myself for giving it a go. I believe
that a big reason for feelings of depression or anger in life is because we've
forgotten our dreams, and aren't being true to ourselves. Recently I found the
book Think and Grow Rich and have been reading that, and have also had friends
that have been supporting me with their words and thoughts. In particular I
have a friend I've made in recent years who is actively encouraging me, and I
can tell you that having just one person that encourages you can make the
world of difference.

\- The Mind's Focus - A work in progress for me is where I focus my mind. If I
can actively do something to make a situation better, then I think of what
action to take to improve that situation. If I'm unwilling to change that or
if I'm powerless to do so then I do my best to let it go, or to remove myself
from that situation. Sometimes this is difficult. Sometimes I have to take a
big action, let people down, or there might be things I want to care about
that I've realised just aren't worth spending the emotional energy on. This is
a big one when it comes to comfort - it may be more comfortable not to step up
and do something, but you're worse off for it.

------
gaze
This article is insultingly bad. Americans are depressed because we have no
social safety net and are one medical incident away from financial ruin.

~~~
closeparen
That link is not exactly clear cut. There’s probably something to it, but
there are unhappy rich countries and happy poor ones.

[https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/01/15/depression-is-not-a-
pr...](https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/01/15/depression-is-not-a-proxy-for-
social-dysfunction/)

~~~
chadcmulligan
So therefore no social safety net and no medical is acceptable?

~~~
dredmorbius
That isn't a charitable interpretation of
@[https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=closeparen's](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=closeparen's)
response, no matter how laudable the goal you're advocating may be.

 _Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone
says, not a weaker one that 's easier to criticize. Assume good faith._

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
chadcmulligan
Indeed, I jumped to a conclusion

------
lasagnaphil
Maybe it’s because neoliberal economical policies (deregulation, austerity,
lower taxes for the rich) has accelerated economical inequality in developed
nations such as the US and UK, and the majority of the working class people
are no longer able to pay for critical services such as healthcare and
education. And the establishment has been so quiet about this issue and just
acting as everything’s perfectly fine, and smartphones are the “real” reason
people are so depressed. The basic reasons behind today’s societal depression
and eventual political instability can really be explained with simple
economics, even if you ignore the cultural changes that neoliberal ideology
have brought.

