I want it all!

Dora_the_Explorer_5

We've evolved to seek pleasure and avoid pain, so buying ourselves a treat and not denying ourselves a treat is natural. Especially if one is unable to see into the future and understand that gym membership fee means less to spend on the monthly mortgage repayment. Sociologists also suggest that the inability to postpone gratification is a marker of the working classes.
Psychologists suggest that research shows that what makes people happy, in whatever circumstances they find themselves, is a large solid circle of relatives and friends.
Here endeth the lesson

LookingAhead

Dora_the_Explorer wrote:

We've evolved to seek pleasure and avoid pain, so buying ourselves a treat and not denying ourselves a treat is natural. Especially if one is unable to see into the future and understand that gym membership fee means less to spend on the monthly mortgage repayment. Sociologists also suggest that the inability to postpone gratification is a marker of the working classes.
Psychologists suggest that research shows that what makes people happy, in whatever circumstances they find themselves, is a large solid circle of relatives and friends.
Here endeth the lesson

Fair enough comments. My initial reaction to that all that was to think:

"But we are (apparantly) the highest form of intelligent life on this planet with the capacity for enormous learning....so you don't have to be a fortune teller to realise that spending money on the gym instead of the mortgage - if you do the maths - is not a good thing".

(And of course I appreciate that not everyone comes to this logical conclusion at the same time and we all have to have our learning / lightbulb moments.)

However we stray from the point there I feel. The whole deal about "treats" just winds me up. It's so overused now. The whole meaning of having a treat has been lost. And before anyone shoots me down in flames, I have to stick my hand up and say I used to be one of the worst for it! Oh how I have learned...

Maybe I am as bad a ex-"treater" as ex-smokers are about smoking!

I wanted to have a rant about sociologists and "working classes" but....it got slightly off topic so I deleted it!

MinnieSpender

Time to hold my hands up here! :T

I allow myself one treat a month on payday. It can be something ridiculous (like a wheelbarrow load of lippy) but lately (since discovering you lot!) it's been getting sadly sensible. This month's treat will be ....

a slow cooker!

:rotfl:

QueenB.

I missed it but will look out for it next week.

My computer and veiwing habits seem to have changed since my LBM, i watch very little TV anyway but i have become a little addicted to money programmes, though i normally end up shouting at the TV:rotfl: and saying to anyone who will listen, even if it is the cats, how they really need to visit MSE:D Martins programme is of course the exception LOL

I do think we have become a treat obssessed nation and i again was one of the worst, trying to cover up the real problems with treats that never really satisfied.

I think part of the problem with being an increasingly wealthy nation and increasingly unhappy one is that by craving money and things and status we are losing track of what is really important.

Now i won't lie, i would love to be comfortable money wise, but i realised a few years ago and even more since my LBM that unless you are truely happy as a person nothing else will work. Now i know it is a yucky cliche but it is true.

As much as i enjoy money and the nice things in life i know what comes first is my and my familys happiness. A few years ago due to family circumstances i had to give up any career hopes and become a full-time stay at home mum. I struggled with this as i am the only one of my friends in this position, all the rest are in great jobs and have nice lifestyles and that was the road i was hoping to go down. I felt less of a person and i was ashamed to tell people.

But now i realise that this time is precious and that you get as much out of it as you put in, more in fact. I no longer feel less of a person and at the end of this life what truely matters is what my family think of me, not anyone else.

There are so many treats i get now which are all free and yet priceless and all of them involve my children and OH. We had a great evening today, after homework and dinner we all spent time playing, baking cakes, playing a board game, reading and talking.

It seems more people are trying to return to a simplier and more family orientated lifestyle because the fact is that for many, not all, but many todays society and its demands just does not satisfy on so many levels.

Maybe one of the best things about debt is that it teaches us about life and we have to become more creative and through that we find out what really matters most to us.

Earth mother rant over now :rotfl:

Floss

Started to watch the programme, but she annoyed me so much I turned it off!

Tondella

QueenB. wrote:

I missed it but will look out for it next week.

My computer and veiwing habits seem to have changed since my LBM, i watch very little TV anyway but i have become a little addicted to money programmes, though i normally end up shouting at the TV:rotfl: and saying to anyone who will listen, even if it is the cats, how they really need to visit MSE:D Martins programme is of course the exception LOL

I do think we have become a treat obssessed nation and i again was one of the worst, trying to cover up the real problems with treats that never really satisfied.

I think part of the problem with being an increasingly wealthy nation and increasingly unhappy one is that by craving money and things and status we are losing track of what is really important.

Now i won't lie, i would love to be comfortable money wise, but i realised a few years ago and even more since my LBM that unless you are truely happy as a person nothing else will work. Now i know it is a yucky cliche but it is true.

As much as i enjoy money and the nice things in life i know what comes first is my and my familys happiness. A few years ago due to family circumstances i had to give up any career hopes and become a full-time stay at home mum. I struggled with this as i am the only one of my friends in this position, all the rest are in great jobs and have nice lifestyles and that was the road i was hoping to go down. I felt less of a person and i was ashamed to tell people.

But now i realise that this time is precious and that you get as much out of it as you put in, more in fact. I no longer feel less of a person and at the end of this life what truely matters is what my family think of me, not anyone else.

There are so many treats i get now which are all free and yet priceless and all of them involve my children and OH. We had a great evening today, after homework and dinner we all spent time playing, baking cakes, playing a board game, reading and talking.

It seems more people are trying to return to a simplier and more family orientated lifestyle because the fact is that for many, not all, but many todays society and its demands just does not satisfy on so many levels.

Maybe one of the best things about debt is that it teaches us about life and we have to become more creative and through that we find out what really matters most to us.

Earth mother rant over now :rotfl:

Queen B sounds like you have a wonderful balance in your life.

LookingAhead

Queen B I got all gooey when I thought about the after homework/dinner things you did with your family. Lovely!