My essential question is “Why does materialism destroy happiness?”

To conduct my research, I chose a chapter from the book, “The High Price of Materialism” by Tim Kasser. This chapter is titled “Personal Well-Being.” I would say it works perfectly with my essential question by discussing the ways that materialism has the ability to damage one’s mental health, as well as their physical health.

Materialism is known as the tendency to consider material possessions and physical comfort as more important than spiritual values. People within a society often believe that money & possessions will make them happy, leading people to organize their lives around that idea. With that being said, having material possessions & desires is not a bad thing, but it can bring about a sense of discontentment in one’s life. When a person is unsatisfied with their life, they are obviously unhappy, but they can also turn to things that may ruin their physical health, as well as their mental health. Such things include alcohol & drugs.

Just as Anthony Patch in “The Beautiful and Damned,” life was modeled around the idea that, if anything, he would always have his money to fall back on. When that is taken away from him, Anthony struggles finding any other form of happiness in life, leading him to drug & alcohol abuse. At the end of the novel, readers evidently see how that has destroyed his life, in more ways than one.

Materialism may not be the root of everyone’s unhappiness, but it does play a part for some, “Although we cannot be sure from these results whether materialistic values cause unhappiness, [...], the results do suggest a rather startling conclusion: the American dream has a dark side, and the pursuit of wealth and possessions might actually be undermining our well-being” (Kasser 9).

The quote above makes mention of the pursuit for wealth & possessions undermining our well-being, which I fully agree with. When one makes the effort to fulfill their desires of having the best things in life, they assume it will automatically make them happier. Instead, it sometimes makes people feel even more empty than before, leading them to want even more material possessions. Anthony & Gloria experience this firsthand when they buy the items they know they cannot afford, they simply want to feel the joy of having something new & fancy.

In conclusion, material items & a person’s desire for those items are simply not worth the damage it can do to one’s life. When you take your final breath, no one is going to make mention of the things you owned, but they will talk about who you were as a person. Anthony Patch ended up with the money that he felt he needed from his grandfather, but he also ended up lonely, unhappy, and suicidal. As Anthony was, many people are impacted by these materialistic desires on a daily basis.

The link was too long so I had to write it in another document to edit the size. Here is the link you can click: https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/31426607/Personal_Well-Being.pdf?1371...