Self help

My supervisor gave me a book to read. Eek. It's a help your self help yourself book. Oh goodness. I have been trying to humour her, because she said she enjoyed it and thought I might like what the author has to say. But try as I might I cannot read more than a paragraph without the urge to launch the book across the room (Sadly it's not my book so I'm not allowed to trash it...its a good thing there are lots of pillows in my house). I'm not sure why she gave me the book to read (perhaps a favour returned as I lent her a Paulo Coelho book from my shelf). But i just don't think I can do it.

My problem with this book is not just that its a help your self help yourself but that the underlying message, the principle that drives the book is basically that old Lebeau adage that our spiritual satisfaction and our ego satisfaction are the same thing, and they are satisfied by the consumption of things. And, well, I guess I'm just too much of a communist or a socialist to believe that material things bring any sort of happiness. In fact, I'm quite certain it's the other way round: that the happier you are, the more happiness you will be able to elicit from material things (i.e. the more simple your needs for material things).

Material wealth does not equal Happiness.
Happiness equals Happiness.

At least my youthful optimism suggests to me that this is the case. Perhaps thats all it is. Youthful optimism. Perhaps my boss just doesn't know I'm not old enough to want things yet. People have never really believed I'm as young as I am. In fact lately the disparity between my assumed age and my actually age has been growing larger and larger. I try to console people "My Korean age is 25..." but this does little to cover embarrassment of people who assumed I was in my mid thirties. I don't mind, I'm a pretty serious person, not nearly as light hearted as those we assume are actually 23. And perhaps this is why I've been offered this book to read.

Still I hope that I will never benefit from this kind of help. God doesn't want you to have a bigger house. You want to have a bigger house. Learning to be honest about that sort of thing is a greater key to happiness than "just believe that God wants you to have it."