Reality and Mammon

With so much pressure from the society arising from money and status, I can't help but think "is money the means to an end" ?

After graduating, and coming to the work force, I do enjoy higher income. Pocket money vs the real income earned. Like many others, I climb the corporate ladder and slowly but surely, income grows. I am able to afford many things I could not when I was in school. Fashionable wear, lastest gadgets, fancy restaurants. Ideally, this should translate to greater happiness.

However, I find that the opposite is true. In fact, I find that my life during my JC and most of the schooling period the most happy. Those times I am broke, but money was nothing compared to skipping lectures for soccer, or checking out cute gals with buddies.

Now that I have more money, but at the same time, lifestyle is so much compromised. I see people talking whole day about money making, nasty and un cooperative colleagues, unethical business practices, backstabbers...etc...

I hardly can find someone in the office that sincerely chat about football, or travelling, or anything else for that matter. Everyone seems so preoocupied with jobs that they dun enjoy doing, just so that they either make a living, or obtain the experience so that they continue climbing the ladder.

My question is:"With all this pursuit, are we neglecting things that we really love, and like?"
quoted fr loveforgadgets

I was reading something on the forum that really intrigues me. the generic question to sum up the article is," will we find true love or true friendships?"

its interesting how we live in this world today especially where in reality, people say Money Talks. how true is this statement? Although it has never occurred to me, i seen so often that people talk about their friends, even themselves being dumped by their partners of years coz of finances, or even careers. you can easily find such stories on forums. has humanity degraded or what most say, we have EVOLVED? simple pleasures of life no longer seem so simple. basic needs such as food are no longer so basic yeah? and gifts are being scrutinized and people are so picky about what they want. everything is designer, luxury, "i want the best, i wan fine-dining" blah blah blah.

did it once occur to you that you actually dine at hawker centres, foodcourts, used that red-leaf pen, drank ocean mineral water before? the "elitism" has gotten so far imbued to our back of our heads and we stoop to a point of evolution that Money Talks. and we literally worship the very tool itself. it seemed so sad that people part coz of money, people pick friends/partners depending on his spending powess/wealth/status. we even resort to low-tactics to enhance and promote ourselves and yet, at the end of the day, is it really worth it? will these millions of dollars, make the inner-us prosper?

to surmise, i read this quote and i simply love it, no offense to anyone :)

“The women who take husbands not out of love but out of greed, to get their bills paid, to get a fine house and clothes and jewels; the women who marry to get out of a tiresome job, or to get away from disagreeable relatives, or to avoid being called an old maid -- these are whores in everything but name. The only difference between them and my girls is that my girls gave a man his money's worth.” - Polly Adler