The American Dream
A few years ago, my mother came to visit. Our relationship is complicated, so needless to say, the tension was running high. My husband and I were bickering (about who knows what) and later in the evening, my mother commented on how she couldn’t understand why we were fighting. She mentioned that in her opinion, we lived “The American Dream.” Prior to her saying this, I’d never really viewed my life in that way. In fact, when she said it, I rolled my eyes.
What is The American Dream to you?
I suppose I had always viewed it as cliche or upon deeper thought perhaps about freedom and opportunity, but to my mother who immigrated here, it’s more about living a life better than she did. She views our home, our “success”, our family, and the capacity to achieve our hopes and dreams as a gift.
At any rate, what she said stuck with me. Most especially in the past few weeks, as I truly have come to realize how fortunate I am to experience many of my dreams coming true. It has shaken me up and humbled me.
Complete with the white picket fence and against all odds…I’m happy beyond words.
Hold fast to dreams,
For if dreams die,
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly. ~Langston Hughes
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Great entry!
Yes in fact most people are blessed and doing well. The amount of marketing we bombarded with everyday on TV, radio, magazines, leads us to believe otherwise. The marketing people want us to buy MORE, i.e SUVs, bigger houses, IPODS, granite coutertops etc.
Those things are nice but they are wants, not needs.
The marketing machine wants us to think buying all this stuff is normal..it is not.
To me the American Dream is having people to love, a place to live and food on the table. The Freedom to think and do what we feel is the best for us, our friends and our families.
Well, since I’m from Canada, I’ll expand this idea to become the “North American Dream.” To me, it’s having the knowledge to live simply and well, instead of having this terrible need to acquire as much as possible as soon as possible. I think the ‘gimme, gimme’ culture we live in is very dangerous for the coming generations, who are being taught that possessions equal happiness and that your parents only love you if they buy you whatever you want whenever you want it. Think about what you would call a “perfect day.” Does it involve a trip to Wal-Mart to buy loads of stuff that you don’t really need? More likely, it consists of time spent with the people you love…no money required. That’s the dream.
Often we just need an external point of view to make us realise how lucky we are and how much we really have.
As a Brit, I tend to think of the American Dream as meaning yes, white picket fences, apple pie, Martha Stewart and home-made quilts: creating comfortable homes and having immacuately dressed children.
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Tiny Blessings
http://amy-tinyblessings.blogspot.com
I’m not an American but I always understood the American Dream to mean that consistent hard work and independence will pay off. A person who builds their own house, digs their own yard, grows their own food and manages to feed their family with no outside assistance is living the American Dream. Or a person who starts their own business and builds it up from nothing until it is floated on the stock exchange is another example. It is the idea that an immigrant or a person from a poor background can succeed just as much as a privileged person as long as they work hard and don’t rely on anyone else to help them up.
Today it would seem that the American Dream is material success. It seems that people work, work, work so that they can own a fancy car, a big house, and lots of other material possessions only to find that they work so much they don’t have the time to really enjoy any of it.
My American Dream is to own a home and have no debt.
Parents & Children – truly a complicated relationship!! My Mom and I chatted the other day about success – and I said I didn’t feel successful – it’s a tough question that requires some serious introspection. Oh well, maybe I’ll think about it later
Great blog – enjoying it.
I truly believe if you have your children’s love and your health, you’re blessed.
that’s a nice poem/quote by Langston Hughes. i remember reading a book of his poetry when i was young and spent my saturdays at the library. thanks, you’ve somehow rekindled in my a spark to get back into reading his poetry.
anyway, i think many who commented already have touched well on the concept of the american dream and also living a frugal life and not be pushed into the whole consumerism thing.
too many people work too hard trying to achieve the american dream when it just might be that they already have it.
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