Anyone who has the slightest observational prowess can see that the American dream is turning into a nightmare.

 

How can this be?

 

For thousands of years people longed (as perhaps the majority of the world who lives in fear and poverty) to live in prosperity and freedom – we have longer and better physical lives than ever before!

 

How is it possible that people literally are wasting their lives! – we are the most depressed, stressed, over medicated, escaping through drugs, media, pornography, sexual predilections, ungrateful society.

 

And the answer lies in three factors:

 

The first is as King Solomon wisely said, “I see light is better than darkness” – ask the sages “does it take the wisdom of Solomon to see that?” – explain the sages – “only a person who suffered appreciates.”

 

Obviously no one wishes to or for anyone to suffer, so how can we appreciate? – this is the miracle of thank-you.

 

When you wake up and count your blessings, when everything that comes your way you see as a gift not entitlement, when you believe you are undeserving hence fortunate, then and only then are you on your way to happiness.

 

The second is the curse of free-time, as Aristotle said “people need to be taught what to do with free time.”

 

No better example than retirement, how on average people die three years after retirement.

 

Yes free time and the pursuit of it, is the dumbest, stupidest invention of the modern era – for we crave a sense of purpose, a sense of accomplishment.

 

I recall coming to my grandfather who though never retired, did slow down, he was already very well off and from a financial point of view didn’t need to do much – he was busy studying Torah and I asked him, “Zaidy are you busy?” (in other words, can I talk to you) he told me “a Jew is always busy!”

 

Truth be told, I cannot recall ever seeing him in the 40 years I knew him not being busy – not frenetic, but purposeful.

 

He came from Poland, a world that for the previous thousand years no one wasted time! – if you weren’t providing, you were studying Torah! – to recapture the three pillars of life: prayer, Torah study and doing goodness and kindness, is to recapture that a moment wasted is an opportunity gone – As so many of us waste our lives, others are busy studying more, earning more (which also leads to goodness and kindness for then you can give more – you family worries less etc.) and quite simply, doing more! – at the finish line, who do you think will be prouder – the busier or more chilled?

 

The third major crises was the sexual revolution – for whereas monogamy created predictability – a home was a sanctuary – a family was a community; today people live like raccoons, ever wandering, ever dislocated, ever lonely.

 

Well, finding love really takes commitment – another lost knowledge that “my commitment to my family’s good is higher than my personal interests” – The more selfish we became, the less happy we become.