The American Dream

Traveling in Europe has completely changed me in a great number of ways, including mental, spiritual and even to a lesser degree physically. These changes have come from a series of revelations and epiphanies. The one I personally found most profound and personally influential is the reality of the American Dream.

I have spent this journey figuring out who I am, who I want to be and what I want to do with my life. These three questions are not easy to answer, but when better than backpacking across Europe by myself. While focusing on what I want to do with the rest of my life I started thinking about what are my dreams, what have my dreams been in the past and etc.

I started thinking about the American Dream. The concept of getting a good education, that leads to a good job, that leads to a well paying career, that leads to a family with a nice house, nice car, etc. This was the dream I was chasing for so long. I had a great job, a serious girlfriend, was payed decently and had money in the bank. I was strolling along life at a great pace. Then the girlfriend left and I was, for the first time in a long while, forced to review my dreams and think about my future. I realized that I was no longer pursuing my dream, my future was good but completely uninteresting to me and something needed to change. That is when I remembered my dream of traveling Europe. I quit my job (on good terms) and 4-weeks later was in Europe. I didn't think about the American Dream or any bigger picture, I just wanted to take this one step at a time.

While here in Europe I started diving deeper into my future and dreams and again started thinking about the American Dream. I kept thinking that it sounds nice, but I get the feeling inside like I want to run away from it. Something about it feels wrong, out of place, unnerving. But why? Why does the concept of a good job, nice house, happy family unnerve me? That is when it hit me. I has nothing to do with the dream, it is that fact that the American Dream is not mine, but someone else's.

This American Dream we have been born and raised to chased is not our own, but instead the dream of someone decades ago that was so appealing that they convinced the rest of the world that is what their dreams should be too. The American Dream is a dream for people who can't find their own. That is why it made me uncomfortable. The dream itself was fine, it was my instinct telling me that it wasn't my dream though. Run, find your own dream, chase that.

When you think about it, the American Dream promotes a lot of problems as well. It teaches us that you always need more, nothing is ever enough. A better paying job, a bigger house, a nicer car and so on. You are not fulfilling the dream until you have more. Look at the problems we have, people can't afford their bigger houses, their nicer cars and so many people I meet hate their jobs, but have to work them to "pay the bills." The bills are for things they don't even care about, but the American Dream has told us we need.

The two biggest dangers the American Dream has created are:

1) It has taught us to not to be content with what we have. We always need more and better.

2) It makes us unhappy for the sake of having more. It lures us into jobs/careers we hate without realizing it because we want more money, a bigger house, a nicer car.

Now I want a good job, I want a family someday and a house, but I want I job I really enjoy, even if I make less. I want to provide for my family, but they don't need the world given to them. A house is a house, if there is a roof, it is in a safe area, I am good. I don't need 3 rooms I hardly use.

But most important those are not my main dreams. When I cleared my vision of the fake American Dream I started seeing all the other dreams of mine that should be considered just as equal or more than the others.

I want to travel and see the world. If my job doesn't facilitate that, then I will find a new one. Life is too short to spend it doing things I don't enjoy. Maybe I will change my mind when/if I ever have kids, but I don't think I will. I think I will be willing to do more I dislike to provide for them than I am now, but I believe I will hold true to my belief and teacher them to do the same.

I want to take back the American Dream. I want to change it from acquiring more to pursuing happiness. That should be the American Dream, the pursuit of happiness. Go out and find your dream. Don't be afraid to leave a job. Jump into the dark, scary unknown. I did and it was the best choice I have ever made. I am now on the road to finding my own dream instead of living someone else's.