The social pressure to play the game, even when you don't need to, is so strong. It is way easier to be happy when you have money than when you don't, and it may be something close to necessary (I guess there's happy poor people) but not anywhere near sufficient. A lot of smart, driven people seem to lose sight of this.
Yeah there was a song by silverchair(?) saying ~ “money isn’t everything, but I’d like to see you try to live without it”. When money has been tight for us in the past, that itself brings stress. Though knowing we have great community, who we could rely on to not starve, to be clothed, and have a roof over our heads alleviates a lot.
I think a lot of times those who don’t have great community around them, are often the ones who will really chase money over other things, because the impact of not having it is so much higher for them.
