What Do You Buy with Money?

“Money can’t buy happiness” is what they say. But is it true?

It is not that simple. People who have a bucket load of money still manage to drive themselves to the ground! There are superstar athletes  who made multi-million dollars in just a short span of time but lost it all, blowing it all off on drugs and other frivolous endeavors! So it’s not about the money itself but how you spend it that determines your happiness.

But then again, on the other end of the wealth spectrum, things aren’t any better either. Would you be happy if you worked hard from 9 to 5 and also all night long, but still didn’t make enough money to get a decent meal? Do you really want to stay poor? So where is the middle ground?

Money only buys materialistic things

First and foremost, what do you do with your money? Money buys material things. Most people dream of possessing and experiencing things like top of the line luxury cars, a gigantic mansion, vacation in Europe, luxurious cruises, having lavish clothing and jewelry, etc. However these things only last for a very short amount of time. Research done by Harvard University, shows that luxurious things, no matter how much we want them in the short term, eventually lose their attractiveness in the long run.

Materialistic things don’t last

You might be happy for a few months, but that’s it! You won’t feel as good after driving the Porsche for a couple of months. Rather than dumping a ton of cash on a Rolex, it’s better to indulge yourself in small and inexpensive ways, as that way, you can have more frequent splurges of pleasure. So once in awhile take a walk to your local bakery or café and enjoy a slice of pie while catching up with old friends. You can also buy yourself a good book or get pampered at your local spa. Small splurges that take away your fatigue and make you feel fresh are much better in the long run. In contrast, that new iPhone will feel like just another smartphone in a week or two. Frequent hits of small inexpensive indulgences are therefore better than extravagant luxuries.

Expensive things buy you “slavery”

If you keep on indulging in luxurious items to satisfy your cravings, you will eventually end up poor (if not bankrupt). It is so easy to get hypnotized by the glamorous items that you hand over your credit card to the cashier without even thinking! Credit cards are a brilliant curtain between you and your money. It’s so easy to feel powerful as you flip them out to pay for things that you might not be able to afford! By the time you get the bill at the end of the month, you’re going to be knee-deep in debt!

The worst thing is that this kind of thing never ends! There is always going to be something more expensive that you wished you had, even though you have plenty of expensive things. The biggest yacht cost multi-hundred-million dollars, while the most expensive car and the biggest mansion will cost a lot too. There will always be a greater ‘Jones’ living nearby and in order to show-off ‘who’s got the biggest wallet’, the deadly cycle of ‘slavery to your own indulgences’ will go on. What’s more damaging is that, if you buy something just to compare to the Jones, then you’ll never be truly happy. This is because you are forced to spend on something that you didn’t love in the first place! So buy what you love, and not to keep up with others.

Freedom is the gateway to happiness

The proper things to buy with money is FREEDOM. Freedom is the ability to have a choice in life. If there is freedom to pursue dreams and good relationships, to change the world, and to spend time with family, then that in itself, is true happiness. How many times have you had to say to yourself ‘that’s impossible’ because you couldn’t afford it? Wouldn’t you rather have the freedom to pursue a career you wanted instead of a job you had to do in order to put food on the table? So if you’re lucky enough to have money, do not waste it. Spend it on the freedom of choice. That will buy you true happiness!

Know what you are buying

Money does buy you happiness if only you know what you are buying. A study by Cornell University finds that buying experiences instead of materialistic things, gives you true happiness.

In addition to buying the freedom to do whatever you want, you can also gain gratification from buying ‘life’s simple pleasures’. By that, I mean, time. We never seem to have enough time and are always chasing after it. However, you can easily get time on your hands if, for instance, you earn enough to be able to delegate your tasks to others. By buying time, you can work on building relationships with others and you can spend it with friends or family. If you are always drowning in work and self indulgence, that you don’t even have enough time for some basic human interactions, you’ll never be happy.

More importantly, buy health! All the time and money in the world cannot make you happy if you suffer from disease or other ailments. Eat nutritious healthy food, go to the gym to work out and visit the doctor for a regular checkup. Oftentimes, families cannot afford regular checkups, which is why diseases like cancer progress to a stage where you are completely helpless. If a remediable disease can be caught early, you can avoid spending tons of money later on when it’s already caused more damage.

In the end, what’s the point of life, if we don’t have the freedom to control it? Use money to obtain time, so you have more freedom to do the things you love rather than just be a money-making machine.