As a voracious reader for many years, I am known to read four or five books at a time---with folded open books scattered next to my bed, my office and the desk in our kitchen (it drives my wife nuts!). I try to convince Elvia (my wife) that this crazy habit is because I have a wide variety of interests, but the hard truth is, I rarely come across a book that is so well-written and compelling that I don't tire of it very quickly. Well, Elvia was overjoyed the last few weeks to find just one book following me around the house---a book so compelling that I couldn't bear to put it down. It is called The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse by Gregg Easterbrook.
In short, if you're feeling down about life at any point in the next few days (weeks or months!) I challenge you to pick up a copy of this book and read it. It will serve as a permanent mood adjustment (drug free!). And, it's not another in a long laundry list of motivational pap that have the intellectual depth of a wading pool, and the lasting impact of a National Enquirer headline. This is a substantive book of sociology, psychology and scientific rigor, written in a highly readable, and engaging style.
The essence of Easterbrook's argument is that, without question, life has never been better than it is now----in every way. Yeah, I know you'll give him the fact that we are materially rich---but you'll exhort that we've never been more ethically poor, or crime ridden. Right? Wrong! I mean, we are richer in every way---even in terms of ethics and crime. If you doubt this, I challenge you to read the book and e-mail me your refutation. (for more evidence of how much better things are, check out this N-C program).
But here's the rub: Despite record levels of affluence and opportunity, we have never been unhappier or more lonely. And much of it, certainly not all--but much, is due to our misunderstanding of the blessings we have been granted from the toil of previous generations. In short, complaining and whining about our lot in life, is a luxury only afforded by those of us in this affluent society. The rest of the world has to work for a living!
I left the reading of this book with a profound sense of gratitude for all the blessings in my life, and I know you will too.
And, for those of you who still say "things were better in the 50's" let me list a few of the realities of that great decade: Children still dying of measles and polio; voting rights for blacks still not secure; workplace rights for women still rare; typical house less than half of today's; air conditioning still rare in the South; U.S. Poverty still above 20 percent; medicare for senior citizens not available; air and water pollution still unregulated.
Truly, would anyone really switch places with someone in the fifties? Not for a day, but for a lifetime?
Read this book, and then take the challenge to turn every complaint you have, into an opportunity to contribute. That way we'll leave the world even better than we found it.
Dan Strutzel
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