“Keeping up with the Joneses” is to strive to match to one’s neighbor for the accumulation of material goods as a benchmark for one’s relative social standing and prestige. The desire to increase one’s position in the social hierarchy, to show off one’s standard of living in relation to one’s peers is responsible for conspicuous consumption and materialism that have been an insatiable juggernaut ever since. With the increasing availability of goods, people became more inclined to spend money frivolously on status symbols to define themselves by what they possessed for the sake of flaunting their wealth and the subtle quest for higher status accelerated.
Why are we killing ourselves this way?
Envy and avarice are fortifying corrosive consumerism and intensifying competitive spending insidiously. Everyone is looking for the television with the biggest screen, the DTH services with the most channels and the smartest phone. Add in desktop computers and high-speed internet. Prolific advertising and product placements have brought the lifestyles of the rich and famous to the gazes of suburbia. Designer cosmetics are now the middle-class norm, and iPod is a necessity.
To fail to “Keep up with the Joneses” is perceived as socio-economic or cultural inferiority, dissatisfaction, even for people whose status is high. Out of this agony arises jealousy. One area in which “living above one’s means” is that of credit card. It may favour profligate spending stepping-up with income, flummoxing luxuries as life’s necessities and get in debt or broke.
The Problem with the Joneses
You end up spending fortune far more than you earn on something you don’t need that only lasts a little while. Yes, gadgets fascinate for a little while, but now they’re a cliché’. Just as you get what other people have, the next “must-have” item rolls around. You can never keep up. It’s impossible. You shouldn’t worry about what they have; it’s your money, so spend it wisely.
What causes jealousy?
If everybody is in misery, everybody is losing, you become gloated. If everybody is happy and succeeding, it tastes very bitter. Jealousy creates anxiety, loneliness, and hate. No one thinks clearly when jealous. So what causes jealousy?
Somebody else has a better house, more beautiful spouse, more money, more charismatic personality. You have been conditioned to always compare. Our whole idea of life is based on “the other person has it and I don’t”. You have to achieve some end; you have to prove your nerve. Whatsoever is the means, who bothers about them. You have to show to the world that you are not an ordinary person. Compare, go on comparing yourself with everybody else you pass by, and great jealousy will be the outcome. Thank God, you don’t compare with birds and with trees. Otherwise, you would be so burdened by jealousy that you would not be able to live at all.
How to handle jealousy?
If you drop comparing, jealousy disappears. In fact why people don’t drop it, is, a miracle, because they don’t get anything out of it except misery! You can drop it only if you start loving and respecting yourself the way existence has made you.
1. Know that the feelings are temporary, just like passing clouds.
2. Know that the person that you are jealous of has done some good karma in the past and they are now reaping the fruit. Take it as an inspiration to gain merit now.
3. Think of all you have that they don’t have and feel grateful. Don’t be a slave to the desires of other people and see that all people that envy you have not brought joy anyway.
4. Realize that in the current of moving time, all will perish. The person who you are jealous of and someone who is being jealous of you are moving towards death. This ultimate realization that we are all going to die, brings you back to your self.
5. Meditate, watch your jealousy. See exactly what it is. Just be in a state of non-doing, because anything done in a moment of jealousy is going to be destructive. Just watch. Slowly, the meditation will create the distance between you and the jealousy.
Don’t keep up with the “Joneses”
If you can’t keep up with the Joneses, can you become the Joneses? This is certainly possible. Several behemoths have one important thing that makes them who they are. While they do try to be the best, they better themselves and the work they produce. They don’t care about becoming famous. They strive for excellence.
If you seek fame, you’ll never really make it. You’re too focused on the outcome and not focused enough on the work it takes to get there.
If you have to compare you should compare with yourself: how you were yesterday, day before, two years back – that’s healthy. See you’ve moved. If someone has done better, then know it can be achieved. Do not compare. You are the best!
It is indeed a wonderful and an inspirational article. I hope that it brings some positive effect on me. Thanks a lot..
Great article..highly inspiring ! looking frwrd fr more such treats !!