The three things that lead to happiness - determined by UC Berkeley scientists

[Igel]

25. Perfect example.

I've known miserable wretches, living in nice circumstances and utterly bitter. All they see is what they don't have. They rejoice at others' misfortune.

I know one old woman who laments that she'll never get out of Social Security what she paid into it. She has *nothing*. She says.

She worked 32 years. She's been retired 27 years. 2400 sq foot house, well decorated, half a million in the bank. She laments having to choose between duck, filet, prawns, or lobster for dinner. Eats out twice a week, after movies or a show. I could pay off my house with her jewelry.

She laughs when she sees a welfare mother whose kid ODed. "She's getting all that free money. Serves her right--she should have to suffer like I do." The Latino tree trimmer falls off his ladder? She laughs. He's poor, but works hard and is happy, joking with his friends. "He has to learn what it means to have a hard life." She worked hard, but at a steel mill. Not hard work, just boring shift work.

I tried telling her she should be grateful for what she has, and she just asked what it was she had to be grateful for? Her husband of 50+ years just turned away. My father and I never understood my mother. She thought themselves impoverished in 1982 with an income over $140k. Steel workers. Lots of overtime.

Then there was the mother of a friend I had in the '80s. She worked minimum wage 30 hours a week, 5 am until 11 am. Restaurant work. Survived because of leftovers from the kitchen and government/church assistance. Couldn't afford heat in the winter. Made her own clothes. Yet she helped her mother and visited her across town 3-4 times a week. Helped her son. Visited people in nursing homes. She laughted, smiled, and was truly grateful for what little she had.

Her son had a minimum wage job working at an apt. complex. The owner had several complexes. He retired at 35. He'd been a CPA and grew his company. Hired a manager and just advised from time to time. Had invested in an employment agency, then he bought it out and hired a manager. He repositioned it and it grew. Had bought wasteland, saw the city grow by the time he was 40, sold a chunk of land rezoned for business and built an apt. complex. Designed another, built it. Designed a third, built it. Had a hobby--restoring prominent, high-end cars from the 1910s through 1935 or so. If it wasn't prominent in some event, documented to be the self-same car--carried the president in a parade, photographed with some dictator, won some notable race--he wasn't interested. Millions in restored cars, sitting there in a warehouse. "Aren't they pretty?" she said when her son showed them to her.

She was glad for him. It didn't occur to her that she should be jealous. She couldn't be jealous or envious *and* grateful. Grateful won. She was happy. She was happy the same year that she made in a year what my bitter, miserable mother made in a month. She didn't die alone, because she had people that she had helped and who visited her. Not most of the people she helped, but enough. And she was glad for those who didn't show up--they were busy and doing better in some way because of her. She had enough gratitude for them, as well.

I learned the appropriate lesson.