I realize that what I am experiencing is nothing but the commonplace for a great many people now. It is the 21st Century, after all, and life has become routinized rest for millions of retirees who planned for it. Still, for the scrupulous, I feel, there is plenty of reason to pause and think how fortunate we are.
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It becomes a problem when we begin to think we deserve this good life.
You would have to explain this to me in order for me to catch your meaning.
I know what you are talking about. You can attribute some of it to choices you have made and good planning. But I get annoyed when people do not recognise how much of the life they enjoy comes down to accident of birth. If you were to be born again, the chances of being born into such fortunate circumstances are slight. People should consider this fact when they consider what kind of policies to support.
Irene gets it.
Then, we are all in agreement, I think. :) That's nice.
When I think of those who don't deserve what they have, I seldom think of old ladies on Medicare and adequate pensions.
This is a value judgment I make, that those who have a roof over their heads and food in the pantry, who are able to have their arthritis treated, and can get to J.C.Penney to buy new underwear, who can occasionally go visit their family in Australia are not UN-deserving if this is what they planned for. I am not trying to switch the discussion here, it's a matter of philosophy, I suppose, I seeing the converse as being valid also (If you can claim to be deserving, others cannot claim you are undeserving.)
whoops, a fix: If you canNOT claim to be deserving, others cannot claim you to be undeserving.
All my planning has been built on the foundation of good fortune - perhaps that realization is where guilt enters.
If souls are doled out by a creator, being born in May 1943 means I could have been planted in the womb of a Jewish woman headed for a Nazi gas chamber, or worse.
Lots of folks who say they made themselves what they are in this country do not consider the automatic head start they had in life just being plopped into existence in a decent surrounding in the good old USA.
Some boosters of one particular political party (Republican) in this country tend to be forgetful of the fortuitous nature of their origins.
Amen Dashmann. For me, the guilt comes from the realisation that I haven't really done anything to deserve such a nice life. Yeah, I might put in effort at work, act fairly sensibly, but so do a lot of people who are less fortunate. I'm not doing anything special!
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