Is it wrong of me to be so completely against all of the things that normal people seem to want? Am I wrong to think that it all seems like a terribly flawed system? A recent trip back to the US found me visiting with old friends and having the ever familiar conversation of our jobs and our futures. The polite, friendly questions, “So, where are you working now?” and “How’s your job going?”. I regurgitated my spiel to my friends, who I know were only half listening, just as I was when they regurgitated theirs to me. Mine still being a pretty up in the air and undecided career path, theirs all being very corporate, concrete, and all-consuming. Yet ironically, I got the impression that most of them felt sorry for me because I haven’t yet figured out what I want to do, and because I’m not yet making the big bucks. When I graduated from UCLA, I knew I need to get out of the USA asap. While Southern California can be a fabulous place to hang out and play with friends etc., it is not the kind of lifestyle I want to get sucked into. Nowhere in the USA is the kind of lifestyle I want to get sucked into. The ‘American Dream’ is not something that really interests me. I often find myself wondering when I’m there if I’m the only person who can see that it’s a lot more like a nightmare than a dream?!?

I know a fair few people in the US who claim they ‘work hard and play harder’ but I don’t think they actually do. I think a more accurate description of what they’re doing is killing themselves for most of the week (making money for someone else), and then they kill as many brain cells as possible each weekend trying to forget what they did all week. The corporate lifestyle in America is shocking to me. What is supposed to be one of the richest countries in the world, with the most powerful leader in the world, and the largest economy of any one country, and is ironically named ‘The Free World’…is a prison to work in! My friends work 60+ hour weeks and most get about 10 days of paid holiday a year (the lucky ones get 14)? WTF is that? That’s such a joke! In the UK 25 is a standard amount of holiday days to start with when you’re still at entry level, and on the continent, in France for example, 40 days is pretty standard. 10 is a f****** joke! For that reason alone I know I’m not cut out to ever live in the US while working in any kind of a corporate job (I also know I’m not really cut out to work in a corporate environment at all). My friends, and friends of friends, are all literally working themselves into an early grave. Some of them in their 20’s are already sprouting masses of grey hair and look closer to 35 than 25…and all for what? A Porsche? A bigger house? A better apartment? To buy things. To be permanently indebted to paying for more things. Vomit. No thank you. These are not things that I care about, they are just material possessions that society has convinced everyone that they want and need. I believe it’s called capitalism.

What about their time? How much time will they get to spend in their house, or in their car (other than the abysmal traffic they will sit in every day commuting to and from work)? What about their happiness, or their quality of life? I’m sorry but I don’t care how much you’re making, things cannot possibly be going well if you only get 10 days of paid holiday a year. There’s no amount of money that could coerce me into only having 10 days off a year for the next 50 years! I wouldn’t even do it for a figure in the billions of $’s (well maybe 1 year for billions - I could negotiate that one).

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE cars (I could watch Top Gear for hours), but until I can comfortably afford to pay for one with cold, hard cash, I opt not to have a car. I also love houses, and real estate in general. Once again though, I’m not going to kill myself to get these things. I also believe that, at least for me, there must be more to life! At this stage in my life, I might not have a lot of money, or control over how much money I’m making, but what I can control, and what I do have, is time. To me that’s priceless and I won’t give it up for anyone. So while all of you over in the ‘free world’ are sitting at your desks, slaving over your jobs, planning your next vacation (and you better plan it damn well – you only have 10 days to take to take it in), or your next big purchase, I encourage you to take a step back. Take a step back and don’t buy it! Just think about whether or not the bigger house, the better car, or the new handbag are things that will really make you happy? Are you willing to spend the next 20+ years paying for them? I wasn’t! When I realised that I was starting to obsess over what my zip code would be, what kind of car I should be driving, and owning the latest Dolce Gabanna handbag, I knew I needed to get out of LA. That’s not really me and those aren’t really things I care about. If buying a house in the USA = being chained to a desk for 50+ hours a week, for the next 10, 20, or 30 odd years, then I’m just not interested. After university, your life should begin, it shouldn’t begin to end. I don’t think life should be finding a soul-crushing job, followed by finding a partner with an equally soul-crushing job, having an over-the-top and ridiculously expensive wedding, buying a house that you will spend the next 20+ years paying the mortgage for, and then having children who will take whatever money you’ve managed to save and then repeat this wonderful circle of ‘life’. No thank you! I just don’t believe that that’s the life for me, and I refuse to accept that that’s what life’s all about. I don’t (and won’t) buy it.