"We now have a smallish house in a nondescript working class Seattle neighborhood with no sidewalks. We have one car, a battered old minivan with a large dent on one side where you have to bang it with your hip to make the door shut. Our boys go to public schools. Our jobs pay enough to support our lifestyle, mostly anyway. If we wanted, we could both do the "next thing" on our respective career paths. She could move to a bigger company. I could freelance more, angle to write for a bigger publications, write a book, hire a publicist, whatever. We could try to make more money. Then we could fix the water pressure in our shower, redo the back patio, get a second car, or hell, buy a bigger house closer in to town. Maybe get the kids in private schools. All that stuff people with more money than us do.

But ... meh. It's not that we don't think about those things. The water pressure thing drives me batty. Fact is, we just don't want to work that hard! We already work harder than we feel like working. We enjoy having time to lay around in the living room with the kids, reading. We like to watch a little TV after the kids are in bed. We like going to the park and visits with friends and low-key vacations and generally relaxing. Going further down our respective career paths would likely mean more work, greater responsibilities, higher stress, and less time to lay around the living room with the kids.

So why do it? There will always be a More and Better just beyond our reach, no matter how high we climb. We could always have a little more money and a few more choices. But as we see it, we don't need to work harder to get more money to have more choices because we already made our choice. We chose our family and our friends and our place. Like any life ours comes with trade-offs, but on balance it's a good life, we've already got it, and we're damn well going to enjoy it.

That's the best thing about the medium chill: unlike the big chill, you already have it. It's available today, at affordable prices!"

The medium chill involves what economists call satisficing: abandoning the quest for the ideal in favor of the good-enough. It means stepping off the aspirational treadmill, foregoing some material opportunities and accepting some material constraints in exchange for more time to spend on relationships and experiences."

grist

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"The truth is incontrovertible.
malice may attack it,
ignorance may deride it,
but in the end,
there it is." -Sir Winston Churchill

that's unAmerican.

Just interviewed for a job at a F500 corporate conglomerate. Late nights, weekends, permanent Crackberry appendage, chest pounding managers, brown nosed back stabbing subordinates. What a miserable way to eke out an existence. Drafty windows, dead lawn, and cheep beer ain't so bad.

 

God forbid...you have to participate in capitalism.   What happened...the market for incense and bracelets fall apart?

No matter, The Clown will have us on the barter system soon enough.   Hang in there.  Don't forget to voluntarily send your gubment more taxes.

What I'm getting from this article is that I have "choice" to live this way. What if this is not the way i choose to live? does this make me greedy? I think everyone has a comfort level and mine is a little above this.     

God forbid...you have to participate in capitalism.

This from a guy with summers off.

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Learn something.  Anything.  Please.

"What if this is not the way i choose to live?"

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. No one is telling you what to do.

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Learn something.  Anything.  Please.

Next time you should pick the right major instead of hanging at Dead concerts....

In this case, 'capitalism' is a three headed monopoly monster with 24 tentacles in Uncle Sam's cookie jar. It redistributes wealth and taxes from the poor to the reich quite efficiently.

why, don't these people realize that if they're not on the treadmill - running fast - that they aren't productive members of society?

how did they get this cushy existance?

thru the blood, sweat & tears of PROUD Amercians. 

now, get out there and SPEND!

Because people go in business to lose money or to support the poor.

 

God, you're an idiot.  It's called private enterprise you moron.

Go give one of those socialist staes a shot AND REPORT BACK FROM THE GULAG.

Mechanical engineering is the wrong major? LOL.

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Learn something.  Anything.  Please.

 

apparently you don't get summers off so yeah...

Who pays your salary? Consumers or taxpayers?

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Learn something.  Anything.  Please.

"It's called private enterprise."

Yeah, because they're privately collecting tax revenue. Life in the 'private sector' is good when the government cheese comes in an easy squeeze bottle.

You guys still really believe this 16 year old kids assertion he is a teacher?
Even after he started as a hot tub salesman
Bragged about making $25 per hour
has changed his age 4 different times
posts when teachers are at work, but students are at home


Come on now.....tell me you are just having fun with the little turd

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Ograbac is a fat lazy bearer of false witness against people.....He is a hypocrite and fake christian.

If  I hadn't read the "Seattle" part I would have assumed that was an interview of the Clown.

But, sure, to each his own. I happen to like working hard. It suits my personality. I'd rather work than sit around on my ass. That I get paid a lot is a bonus, but not my motivation. I do my own yard work for 4 yards because I like it, not for the pay (lack thereof, to be precise). Mind you, I do hate missing good surf because of work - but I get in my share.

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I :heart; Q

What?! When has someone made too much money though? The writer of this piece has chosen to go for a more modest lifestyle. At what point has someone else made so much money that the writer of this column has earned a piece of it? Many of the "rich", that the Dems want to make out to be the root of all problems, don't know what it is like to drive to or from work in the daylight and their personal and work lives are so intertwined that the concept of having a weekend off escapes them. So you say "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." but you guys contradict that statement daily by the policies you advocate. You should say: Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness...BUT if you pursue too much happiness, we reserve the right to play Robin Hood with your profits and call you greedy, regardless of how hard you worked to get where you are.

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"The government who robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul," - George Bernard Shaw

“Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to f—k things up.” - Barack Obama

“End of quote. Repeat the line.” - wise words from Joe Biden

Life , liberty and happiness was the point I was trying to make.

That sounds like a lot of Italians I know (Italy Italians, not the Jerzee type), except the standard of living is higher over there.

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"Hey, where's Cricket?" - Kristi Noem's daughter.