Disclaimer: This post probably makes me sound like a bad person.
How would you like to:
*Run a profitable, successful, totally set up business for free?
*Free college and job placement with all the right connections?
*Marry an heir, have some kids, and be set for life?
How about all 3? Just because you were born for being you.
Spoiled Adults
A spoiled adult is…an unpleasant sight. They can be difficult to deal with. My friend, Soaps, has a tendency to lie and does as she pleases especially when it comes to hiding things from her parents. Regardless of consequences, I remember facepalming myself on several occasions when she tells me her latest scheme to hide new debts from her mother.
Her parents aren’t monsters. Her parents are normal upper-class folks. Their goal now is to guide her to become an independent adult who will be in an OK position in life without their intervention. That’s not a huge goal or even an odd goal. Every single parent out there wants to have independent adult children.
But it’s hard. You can’t undo a childhood of enabling acts and having parents giving her everything.
⭐ “That’s Interesting!“
- Panhandling: How Much Money Do Panhandlers REALLY Make?
- How To Make Money As An Instagram Influencer (Internet Fame That Pays?)
- 39 People Who Got Richer AFTER Quitting Their Day Jobs
- Can Being a “Friend-For-Rent” Really Make Extra Money?
Jealous of a Friend
I’m not going to lie, there are some moments I’m very jealous of Soapy for her life and her parents. My childhood sucked big time compared to hers.
Now I’m just being completely honest here. I believe you can be an objective friend and support them even if there’s jealousy creeping behind some of it.
It’s kind of cathartic to know it’s human nature.
(Unless I’m the only person that has ever felt this way then I may have just self-confessed as a b*tch ?)
I resent my friend Soaps sometimes because of all the global poverty in the world and very few blessings…she was born with such a blessing.
There’s nothing wrong being born privileged to me at all. UNLESS it goes to those who waste it.
To me, that would be the ultimate sin and that’s my philosophy.
And that’s why I continue struggling every day with feeling like a lucky raindrop even though everybody can just tell me to sit back and enjoy being married to my well off Mr. Hippo.
I don’t want to be born capable of contributing to mankind but choosing to not advance or connect with mankind in any shape or form. Even worst, causing more problems and leading a life of nothing.
Yeah yeah, I’m a conventional model citizen…it’s enough to make rebel boy poet Rimbaud roll over in his grave.
~
For those of you who are new here, here is a synopsis of my friend, Soap. She is one of the many colorful characters I’ve noted from my life.
I added this portion so no one is missing a piece of the puzzle:
Soap is one of my best friends. She is also the daughter of a very affluent, multi-millionaire family. She grew up in Salt Lake City, UT. Her childhood was what one would call pure opulence and she had many privileges most people can only dream of.
Her sister is married to the wayward son of a Chinese billionaire and Soap herself…well, she is in her 30s with a drinking problem. She has terrible health and cannot hold down a stable job. At age 30, she started with $80,000 in refinanced consumer and medical debt and some unpaid taxes as well.
Although her parents can easily wipe the debt away, they think it would be better for Soaps to learn how to manage her own finances by learning to live frugally and focusing on her career and education. Both of Soap’s parents fall under what you call, the sensible rich.
Soapy’s parents immigrated to the United States from China in the 1970s. They’re open minded and highly educated (in contrast to my own immigrant parents). They educated themselves, worked very hard, and became successful engineers and then entrepreneurs within two decades. Now they want to pass on their successful international trading business but to no heir.
Soap was the only heir of choice but she repeatedly declined to learn her family’s business. Now her parents have stopped asking. To Soaps, her parental life work has no appeal what-so-ever. It is not how she wants to live her life, even at the guranteed of wealth.
Read the previous posts in Soapy’s Odessey:
- 21 Frugal Pantry Staples List on a Limited Budget
- Practical Budgets For People Bad With Money
- How To Effectively Overcome Credit Card Addiction
- 3 Signs When Frugality Isn’t Worth It & What To Do
- Why You Still Need An Emergency Fund While In Debt
- How Soapy is Geoarbitraging in China
- What Am I Doing With My Life? I Need Help With My Life.
- How To Afford $800 Shoes When You’re $100k in Debt
~
Resentment for Her Wasting Life
Because it’s my personal belief that every human is born with a capacity to contribute, it sets off a lot of contradictory feelings when one of your greatest confidants in life is set on wasting hers. Some days I feel a slight shameful resentment towards Soap. She could have it “all” in my eyes.
I care a lot about her as a friend but that doesn’t mean I have to like her crappy life choices.
The thing that knocks me the most is…she had every opportunity in the book. Why can’t she have done something with that? It’s like getting a game and playing it on Tutorial mode…and then not listening to the tutorial.
(I am super chill with my over-reaching terminology of “contributing to mankind.” If you went out and did 3 minutes of work, then you made a difference somewhere. I am not strict with that at all.)
But Soap is largely what I define as wasteful. She doesn’t work-work currently, right now, she gets paid to drink with her rich friends. The last thing she told me via messenger was:
“I just spent 17…legit…17 hours playing Candy Crush yesterday. I had to lean in the corner next to the charger port to play. I was so sleepy I just crashed. What the f*ck be my life…”
When she told me that a few nights ago, I just hit my limit.
It is just the perfect summary of everything that has happened. It is integral to why she is where she is in life. And even with her support system (including one very annoying blogger yours truly) she still manages to dig deeper without wanting to flail for survival.
That was about all of the Soap updates I could take because I was about 99.9% full of the “What Are You Doing With Your Life?” resentment meter.
I think I was mad and exhausted so I just put the phone down and decided to not speak with her until the morning.
Soaps have had a lot of chances in life to start over. She gets these chances to this day:
*Full training to inherit their trading business.
*Her family is in full financial support if she returns to college and graduate.
*Be set up with someone from their high society’s circle, marry an heir, then be a mom.
How awesome is that? Any sane person reading this would holler, “Hey those are awesome deals! Wish that was me!” And only a small portion of people who work hard every day gets to have privileges like these for their kids.
My parents worked manual jobs to make sure we make it through the month. At the end of that 17 years in the United States, they have nothing to show for it. I would have killed for 1/16 of the opportunities the universe presented to Soap from birth.
More and more, it seems I’m just coming from an area of jealousy. Every time I talk to her, I just want to scream:
“If I had your life and set up, I would have done this and this and this. I wouldn’t continue to squander it playing phone games, watching Netflix, and daydreaming about free vacations for years on end.”
I’m sure it’s not pleasant for her to hear that because I did tell her that several times before. It drives me nuts. There’s so much potential and no drive despite her given smartness and her privilege. To me, it’s an utter waste.
Conclusion
When she got a job or right before she left to geoarbitrage in China, I was very proud of her. I would feel no resentment on her life if she allowed herself to get ahead. Because she could if she wanted to. In fact, I’m third in line behind her parents and grandparents to help her.
She was there for me when I needed her as with all good friends. I believe she’s a fantastic friend and overall a good person. But is she conventionally an independent functioning citizen? Not really…
It’s not easy to help someone who is more or less content with the bare minimum. And I think I just have to accept that. My visions in life, her parents’ vision in life for Soaps = isn’t for Soaps.
It’s not her goal. It was never her goals. She doesn’t want to own a boring business and do business things. She doesn’t want to go back to school. And she doesn’t want some set up by her parents’ and married off.
Renegade life!
She doesn’t want any of those things on the list enough to give up her freedom in life. If her freedom includes being able to play 17 hours of Candy Crush, freelancing for just enough to feed herself and pay rent and maybe some economic stimulus from her family occasionally. So be it.
When she gets older, her parents will layout plans for her after they pass so she’s taken care of. Although spoiled, she is still their child and loved. I remember about 6 months ago she told me something in passing:
“I’m pretty comfortable with my life. I work when I want to and make my $2,000 a month. I have enough to feed myself and pay rent. My life isn’t great but it’s very comfortable for the work I put in. I have friends who can take me out to lunch and my life comes with a lot of freedom. Pssh, I don’t think about debts. I pay it like I pay the rent when it comes, it’s the same thing basically.”
That’s an interesting way to think about life compared to……….every single grain of personal finance.
And that’s all she wants from life for the amount of work, that’s her ideal. Some people are OK with less as long as they can have their fun. She doesn’t mind debt. It’s just like rent to her. I don’t agree with that (nor does her mother) but you can pull a horse to water, it doesn’t mean you can make the horse drink.
That’s just…how Soap is as a person. You can’t change a person so it’s better to move past those feelings of resentment and disappointment.
Whatever resentment and jealousy I feel against a friend or someone like Soaps…well, that’s my issue. Not hers.
What would you do if you had a child like Soaps? Would you throw your hands up at this point? What would you implement or nothing at all?
Financial Freedom Starts With Saving:
Personal Capital: Sign up and use their net worth calculator for FREE. They are a free financial service platform that helps you analyze your portfolio, retirement, and financial health all on one simple & secure account
Imperfect Foods: We all need groceries. Try out Imperfect Foods to get $80 off ($20 off your first 4 orders.) Read my review of this revolutionary and money-saving grocery delivery service.
ThredUp: The only online recycle clothing store I currently shop and sell with. Great mission statement, company model, customer service, prices, and selection. Sign up with our invite link and you can get $10 free in ThredUP credit.
Survey Junkie: SJ is one of the few survey companies that are 100% legit, user-friendly, and great for making extra money. Earn up to $1,000 a month doing surveys online. You can make anywhere from $5-$20/day in your free time.
I’ve known plenty of people that came from privilege. Some were good hard working people… others were not.
Those that were not, never really had the background to understand why working hard and staying out of debt was a good idea. They never missed a meal in their life, and had everything they could possibly want.
It isn’t their fault of course, but that’s the context from where they make decisions. You and I grew up very different. We didn’t have that same financial safety-net. That’s our context. It’s where we make decisions from.
Your friend Soapy will probably never change in her life. Can’t resent her for that because she never had the same experiences we did. Being poor shapes a person just like being rich.
That’s exactly what my husband said when I told him how I felt. It is very true, experiences shape people and teach people. I never experienced her life and she never had mine.
Sometimes i feel like it isn’t that crappy people waste the opportunities/privilege they have… sometimes i wonder if it’s the privilege that makes them crappy/lazy people.
Which in turn scares me for my daughter…. the last thing i want is to raise a spoiled brat, simply because she has a more financially secure life than some other people in the world.
“Sometimes I wonder if it’s the privilege that makes them crappy/lazy people.”
Me toooooo. I don’t have half the smarts some of these peeps but I try doubly hard. I don’t know why with all these gifts they don’t take advantage of it. I gotta work x2 hard in school to get to where they’re born into.
I’m sure your little girl is gonna be great when she grows up!!
There will always be people who waste whatever gifts/opportunities they have. Some are highly intelligent and don’t apply themselves. Others have amazing situations where they have opportunities given to them but don’t take advantage of them. I gave my ex wife an amazing opportunity which she completely tossed aside (and was completely ungrateful for. She had just finished medical school in England when we were about to get married. I was wrapping up a radiology residency program. Radiology is a very competitive residency to get into. When she said she would like to go into radiology I made a deal with the program director that if I stayed on as faculty for the length of her training he would give her a spot in the program. So she basically got into a program she would have never qualified for on her own. Promptly 2 months into the program she got fired from the job due to certain things cropping up. After that she tried to get into a residency program (any specialty) for the remainder of our marriage but because of her black marks she couldn’t get in.
Kids from very wealthy families do have a risk of becoming entitled. As a parent you have to take steps to prevent this from happening but I admit it is very hard thing to do when you can provide everything for your children but choose not to.
Xray, at some point you have to let people rise./fall on their own. I have that problem right now with one of my kids….had a golden opportunity…wasn’t easy, but he basically walked away. Now he’s blaming everyone but himself….
Ah, good point. If you let them fall, they might learn from their fall. I think Soap’s parents didn’t let her fall enough. It’s always one bail out after another.
“I made a deal with the program director that if I stayed on as faculty for the length of her training he would give her a spot in the program.”
Oh wow, that is a hugeeeee advantage. I bet her resentment and jealousy was huge.
I imagine its super hard not to give them everything when you can. I’m holding my cup steady when we have kids, the last thing I want are spoiled kids.
I can relate what you’re saying here about Soaps to the way I feel about being blessed with disease-free health. My brother has type-1 diabetes and I feel since I’m healthy I’d be a fool to waste my health and get fat etc. So I don’t let it happen.
If I were Soaps I’d probably try to translate that responsibility of being born wealthy and do good with it. So I understand where your resentment comes from. It’s human. To be honest, she kind of sounds like Paris Hilton…
I was about to say that! Soapy does remind me of Paris Hilton. Somebody who gets paid to drink with her friends? Geesh, must be nice… 🙂
She wants to be Paris and an Instagram celebrity all at once. It’s a different view! Makes the world grow bigger with differences I guess 🙂
Paris Hilton is legit one of her teenage heroes. Soap thinks she’s #goals.
Sounds like it’s not jealousy, more like disgust. You see your friend’s potential being squandered again and again, and are trying as hard as you can to pull her over the finish line, but just can’t do it anymore. Because you can’t pull her. Only she can get there herself, and sounds like she’s got a long way to go before she gets there. Hanging up the phone was probably the best move you could have made. One thing that’s freeing about being in your 30s versus your 20s is you learn life is too short to give so much time and energy to people who suck you dry. (Plus you have too many other people to take care of that legit rely on you). I have been in your shoes, railing against the stupidity that was my friend and her bad choices! And then ultimately I just put a LOT of distance between us and it was a good move. Anyway you are a good and caring person and there’s no doubt Soapy doesn’t deserve you. I also want to say that you are in no way a raindrop, as you bring in a boatload of income to your family in your own right!
I’m sure Paris Hilton is one smart cookie, she did make tons of money being famous for being famous!
It’s only in my mind that I think it’s a huge waste so there’s definite disappointment there. “Only she can get there herself, and sounds like she’s got a long way to go before she gets there.” YUP, basically, because I don’t want to get angry or nag her. It’s not going to work.
Thank you for your invaluable insight Laurie <3
This is the worst fear that a parent can have. In my view, if my kids failed to be a responsible adult, then I also failed too because it’s a result of my teaching and nurturing.
If my kids don’t want to help themselves, then I will give myself three chances to try to help them right the ship. After three strikes, if they still want to be like Soap, then I would rather leave my money to help others.
I rarely get a free ride in my life, so if people around me wants a free ride, they need to earn it.
Hopefully, your friend will come to her senses sooner rather than later. oh yeah, you don’t need to be jealous or frustrated, just do what you can control.
“I rarely get a free ride in my life, so if people around me wants a free ride, they need to earn it.”
If they need to earn it then it’s not a free ride.
You’re not alone. I was jealous of my best friend in middle school because she did better in school than me. I hate to admit this, but I’m also jealous of my own hubby for being smart and making more than me. Jealousy and envy, I think, is normal and part of human nature. All of us go through such feelings at one time or another. I’m still jealous of one of my high school classmates for being smart, pretty, tall, and having rich parents lol.
Anyway, your feelings are completely normal. What’s important is that you still support her and want the best for her. it’s hard to see someone you love digging a deeper hole for themselves although they have every opportunity to turn over a new leaf. Who wouldn’t be upset about it?
Thanks Ms. FAF, I feel better 🙂
“I’m still jealous of one of my high school classmates for being smart, pretty, tall, and having rich parents lol.”
So relatable! I had the same classmate too.
I’ve had a couple of billionaire friends, one was on the Forbes richest 200 Americans list. He had four sons all who worked pretty hard in the family business and all who were good people who treated others pretty well. The dad worked them very hard but they did not work their kids as hard and their kids grew up much more entitled. I think each successive generation grows further away from the ideals of the founder and that by the third generation often the kids are spoiled.
“that by the third generation often the kids are spoiled.”
I heard that too. I’ve seen it in some historical cases too! Ugh such waste.
you might not find this surprising, but i relate a little to ms. soapy. i wasn’t born wealthy blessed with intelligence that some considered a great gift. the people who didn’t learn or recall hard subject matter so easily decided what i ought to do with them. the thing is, that isn’t what i wanted. i always felt so long as i wasn’t a burden to anyone then i’ll be just over here doing what i want on my terms. it was only around my mid-30’s that i took this life more seriously and am not sure if i’m better or worse off for the change. sure, there’s more security, but if not for responsibility to mrs. smidlap i might have eschewed that.
Oh I find it very surprising! You said mid 30s was when you took things more seriously? I hope Soaps gets there too but you never know with her.
Why is soapy renting when her family is rich?
In other words living in a family purchased abode
What is American soapy doing in Toronto?
$2k with no rent is adequate to live off of for single without debt servicing if possible to be free of debt habit
Ops I mean y is she not living rent free in family paid abode
Haha I thought someone Canadian would pick up on that. Soap use to live with her grandparents but her parents stopped her. She is often sick and they’re old with fragile health so it’s like a germ back and forth in there. She had to leave. Soap’s family is split between US and Canada. $2k isn’t adequate (which is why she continues building debt) but it’s enough for now because her mom is paying for her rent and debt bills out of…well there’s no other choce.
Her parents really want her to learn responsibility and independence is what I think, combined with their general disappointment. It’s not a money issue or anything.
This is one of those human conditions in which we can all relate.
When it’s quiet and I am able to gather my thoughts, I believe that our disdain is more of a reflection of ourselves . We are sad to see such potential and opportunities being wasted, because if we could be put in same situation, we could easily succeed in what they choose to discard. You are jealous of things not being given as easily and are also sadden at someone not valuing what they were given.
From their perspective, they might think we are wasting our lives to save money and plan for an uncertain future, instead of living in the now.
As long as they are truly happy with their life – live and let live. Just be their friend. Until they hit rock bottom, they won’t see a need to make a change, regardless how well thought out your good intentions are. Some will eventually wise up; some will never until all the doors of opportunities are shut.
“You are jealous of things not being given as easily and are also sadden at someone not valuing what they were given.”
“As long as they are truly happy with their life – live and let live. Just be their friend.”
Such a gold filled nugget of a comment Cal, thanks.
“They might think we are wasting our lives to save money and plan for an uncertain future, instead of living in the now.”
She totallllllly thinks that. We discussed that so many times and we couldn’t be more opposites.
“Disclaimer: This probably makes me sound like a bad person”
LOL. That’s such a funny disclaimer. And so not true. It makes you sound like any reasonable person 🙂
Haha :p
Maybe your friend’s issues have a basis in her mental health rather than just being spoiled? Playing candy crush for 17 hours straight seems like a symptom of a potentially larger problem to me and your descriptions of her behaviours have lots of other warning signs for this. A screening might be in order.
I thought about that too. Soap has done things like this all her life, even when she was working and living it up good. Oh IDK, as long as she’s not depressed, I’m not as worried.
let’s see, we have one young lady who despite being eco disadvantaged as a kid grew up to be self-reliant, funny and resourceful. We have another young lady who like what you have laid out wasted 17 years+ with her life (not 17 hours my dear).
whom am I “jealous of”? easy answer.
Haha, sharp point perfectly said!! I wonder if maybe my disadvantages made me kick harder in life. If I was soaps maybe I would be the same too because I didn’t have those disadvantages.
I have a few soapy friends, it can be irritating to watch,
I also get a little frustrated by a family friend that has made a ton of money, and he does work hard, but refuses to give any credit to the massive leg up he got (some interest free loans from Mom abd Dad – few hundred thousand) – I call it human nature and something I just take note of as a person and a parent and then push it out of mind.
Oh god irritating is a good word. I almost don’t want to say that but sometimes…arghh I just want to grab and shake her. I call it human nature to self soothe too, takes a lot of people to make the world interesting and whole.
I don’t have a rich friend like yours. I think it’s great that you have a close friend like that actually.
I guess the main question is: if you have it? If she’s happy, or at least content, that’s probably all that really matters.
And if she’s not, she’s probably going to do something about it. And if she doesn’t, then it probably means she is pretty content in reality 🙂
Sam
I’m super lucky to know her, she’s just a very interesting spirit 🙂
“And if she’s not, she’s probably going to do something about it. And if she doesn’t, then it probably means she is pretty content in reality”
I think that’s what it boils down to too, she’s comfortable in her way, so be it. Whatever issues on my end = MY issues period. Thanks Sam for stopping by!!!
No, it doesn’t make you a bad person. Just normal.
My Dad was talking about this to me. Many of his doctor colleagues-power couples (Cambridge graduates, smart and high achievers) are having this sort of problem with their children despite having everything. They always seems to end up being everything that their parents were not.
Well they do say shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations. Ahhh… Life of the 富二代….
I can empathise. It’s more of the frustration that you’d kill for a fraction of the opportunities given to them; making your head explode like Vesuvius. You worked hard by yourself and made it pretty well, if they put in a fraction of the effort it make their situation infinitely better. It’s really no effort at all.
I had 6 Asian friends like that (Korean & Chinese), it was a a lot of headbanging but after a while they seemed to get it. I had to show them that this was what “normal people” had to do to get by, taking them to the hospice and orphanage I volunteer at seemed to have given them a good perspective on how good they had it.
Eventually they went to become more involved with their parent’s company with me as their assistant, or they began to independently pursue what they wanted. The best thing, there was no more messing around. Their parents are happy, as long as they’re not aimless anymore.
They are good people, just very protected. I’m kind of part of them now, though still as an outsider, but I can say this, it does make you very insular.
Mo money, mo problems.
People only change if they want to, but they do change.
Love this Will! Love everything about this.
I googled shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves, oh good god, there are posts dedicated to it. >_< "Keeping family stories alive can help younger generations better understand their parent’s and grandparent’s contributions as well as the work needed to build and maintain family wealth. Combining an awareness of one’s past with thoughtful strategy for the future can help families overcome the Three Generation Cycle." That's horrifying to me. Pretty sure my generational wealth plans would be meaningless if my granddaughter was simply an unfrugal brat. If that was the case, I just...I gotta keep my blog online just for that! Frugal GENES. You better do what gammy says and save your money!!
Yeah totally agree. Frightening; it’s actually what keeps me partly motivated. I never want to reverse everything my parents sacrifice to give to me.
Heheh, keep blogging for sure. The selfish part of me will enjoy the fun stories to come.
IMHO there are two motivators in life, fear and desire. While in my opinion it is healthiest to be coming from a place of desire, fear can be a powerful motivator and I believe when experienced while young sticks with us subconsciously and drives our decisions. What I have observed with people who have opportunities they squander is that they suffered no serious fears while at the same time having no significant desires. They have often never been allowed to truly fail, to truly hit a rock bottom, to truly experience what life can be like when you are on the bad end (note this is assuming they had an otherwise reasonable childhood and early life with no abuse, because that changes the picture dramatically). Typically this is because they are financially saved, often by parents, but just as often by siblings and friends, even if they hit desperate times. Then you add that they generally are good at many things so no one calling shines above the rest, and they sit with no direction, no motivation, and no energy to do even the simplest of things to get themselves ahead because everything looks the same to them. I also believe some people have a glitch where they aren’t motivated, aren’t really excited. Maybe it’s a form of depression or more like apathy. Regardless, until such a person is faced with no other option, why change? Deep down they know they’ll be saved, so why stress? With respect to kids, you have to find the ways to stress them so they change, hopefully without crashing and burning, but if they do, let them pick themselves up, dust themselves off and move on. 90% of it IMHO is teaching them self reliance and much of that is learned by doing and succeeding with occasional failures.
Very true and this was my general thesis I had going into this. Failure was not permitted and/or there was safety net after safety net. I recall Soap saying she wanted to be an entertainer (Paris Hilton being an old fav) but her parents wanted their daughter to go a traditional career route. I guess when you have an unconventional desire with conventional parents who shoot it down – it could make a person stop caring (no significant desires) and pair that with no significant fears…in the end you get lots of soaps of the world. It’s almost like a TV trope!
Obsessed with your blog and frugality !! This post was very interesting. My 2 cents is that trying your best to have empathy helps, there’s probably a lot of things you don’t know about soaps relationship with her parents and her childhood. She may act like she could care less but a person does not simply give up wealth and a cushy life with parents to try and get by on her own. Everyone’s idea of freedom and happiness is different I suppose … another contrarion perspective to consider is that it’s because a percentage of wealthy kids / privileged individuals squander their privilege such that there is opportunity for hardworking or motivated individuals from lesser fortunate backgrounds to succeed and climb social strata. In a strange way one could also be grateful to people like soaps giving chances for others to succeed eg if she went back to college even though she had zero interest another desperate applicant could have missed his chance …
There is a point to that!! I asked Soap if she ever wanted to declare bankruptcy to get out of it but she thought it was immoral to place that responsibility on others. I was very alarmed because, in all this misery, she seems to not burden anyone else (besides her parents who can definitely help her). I don’t know…there’s a whole level of psychology to it that is amazing to Soaps.
Many of us have similar experiences with a friend or worse family. It’s not always even money. It could be the super intelligent family member with a free ride to college that squandered the opportunity and never went anywhere. There’s a case to be made that a little adversity is a great motivator . Without the it perhaps people struggle to find a purpose.
I think you’re more frustrated than jealous. You see someone who takes all of her blessings for granted and you wish you could tell her how great her life could be if she just put some effort. I don’t hear jealousy in your tone, I hear a caring friend who sees her friend wasting all of the resources we Frugal people appreciate and value. I hope she comes around one day before it’s too late.
Despite the bad press it gets, I’m guessing you either are a fan of or would be a fan of Atlas Shrugged.
Francisco D’Anconia basically says exactly the same thing every time he opens his mouth over the 1,000-page book. He was born into massive wealth and seeks to earn it; he looks down unforgivingly on those who are born into wealth and do the opposite. One of the most inspirational characters in literature, if you ask me.
Extreme privilege can be detrimental to a person. It doesn’t have to be but it’s pretty sad and frustrating when it is. Yeah, your emotions sound pretty normal. I do give you credit for remaining her friend and admitting your jealousy is your issue, not hers.
In another 10 years, if not sooner, I don’t think you’ll be friends with her. As time goes on, the gap between the completely unambitious and those with goals gets wider and wider and you have less and less in common.
There’s really no reason to be jealous of her at all. She’s not living a life that will lead to any kind of happiness.
I additionally get somewhat baffled by a family companion that has made a huge load of cash, and he manages job hard, yet won’t give any credit to the enormous advantage he got (some premium free advances from Mom abd Dad – barely any hundred thousand) – I call it human instinct and something I simply observe personally and a parent and afterward push it out of psyche.