In todays society, we are thought to look at what others have, and get envious. "If he has X, then I deserve X as well. It is my right. My fundamental birth right. If he doesn't give me X, then he is evil. Because I deserve it as much as he does."
But we should look at it from a different perspective. Not "what do others have", but "what do I do, and what do I get for that?"
We all live in a house or a flat. We might think "I deserve a bigger home, person X has a mansion, and for this reason I deserve the same." But apart form person X, which we will not discuss further here, we should examine all the things that we get. And compare them with the things that we do.
Someone had to build our home. Brick by brick. And someone had to create these bricks. If our home gets into a state of disrepair, someone has to fix it.
We all own a smartphone and many other technical systems (a PC, a TV, a radio, a printer etc.) Someone had to invent them. And it wasn't the work of an individual, but of countless people. And someone has to design the hardware, and build the hardware, mine the minerals, transport the minerals and hardware to the manufacturer that assembles everything.
Someone has to write the software on these phones. Each app typically has several developers. And these developers use libraries written by other developers. And the final product costs mere 100 € (or 1000 €, if you are vain and want to have a luxury product with the best hardware and software that is currently available). In the year 2026 a smartphone for 100 € is sufficient for day to day activities.
If you have a car, someone has to design and manufacture the car. Someone has to pump oil, and ship it to your gas station. Someone at the gas station has to make sure that you don't forget to pay after filling up your tank.
There are so many people involved in your consume. And the value that you get is immeasurable. Even the poorest people on this world can participate in the technological and economical advancements. Even the poorest in Germany can own an iPhone, drive a car, live in a beautiful flat and eat and drink as much as they like.
Just think about how your work helps other people. Be proud of how you improve the world. And always remember to think "Would I have been able to mine the minerals, furnace them, cast them, assemble them to get to a car engine and car chassis?"
"Would I be able to write a whole operating system and applications for a smartphone, while concurrently designing the chips, melting the sand for the silicon and pulling an immaculate single crystal of at least 30 cm radius, carving the lithography mask, building this machine that shoots laser beams onto tin drops to get to the EUV radiation needed to get to the small 5 nm process?"
"Would I be able to develop a cure for cancer?" Sure, the prices for these pills have an impressive number of zeros behind them, while the pills are rather small. So it's a large amount of money for a small amount of volume. But maybe it is that expensive because of what is inside this pill. Maybe the development is very expensive, with thousands of people involved, researching the correct substance, developing a manufacturing process in a larger scale, creating the precursors, countless clinical studies that make sure that these pills actually work. Several round of improvements. And this tiny pill might save your life. Maybe it is even nice that it's not 20 times larger, which might reduce the price per volume, but also make it harder to swallow.
We take too many things for granted. Our own work doesn't justify the value that society gives us. Not in the slightest. So we should be grateful for this miracle, that is called society and market economy.
Instead of comparing our blessing with someone elses, we should just be grateful. Each and everyone of us lives in paradise. Nobody could have ever dreamed of the riches that even the poorest people own today.
And it is good, that this is the case. Everyone in this world gets much more than he deserves. And we can be happy that everyone is rich. Sure, there do exist drug addicts that live on the street, but if you are addicted to heroin or alcohol, then every moment that you are high is a good moment and every moment that you are not high is a bad moment. Regardless of the clothes you wear, the things you own, and if you call a bridge or a mansion your home. Just look at 27 Club. Many rich and famous people get addicted and kill themselves, and still our media preaches to us that being rich and famous are the only virtues to aspire to.
Life is just hard.
If you are searching for happiness, good luck. You might be happy sometimes, and that's great. Buf often you will just be not happy. At all. Regardless of what you do. Because there aren't many pleasant activities that are also meaningful.
Life is suffering. It is pain. It is existential angst. It is illness. And we all will die. Soon.
Life is just not Disney style. Its not colorful. It's not full of joy. It's black, white and grey. It's full of suffering. Ariel originally gets her tongue cut out, has pain like getting stung by 1000 needles when walking on her new legs, does not get the prince, and finally kills herself by jumping into the floods. Thats the real life.
The only thing that you can do is find something that is worth your suffering.
Is all this pain and suffering worth it to dwell in your little room, play video games, doom scroll through social media and wank to porn? Probably not.
People used to have religion as their meaning. They bear their suffering (their cross) for god.
Others did it for their family, their community, maybe for their emperor and their nation.
The key is always to ask: "Why should I go through all this suffering?"
Meaningful things are usually difficult. And not a little difficult. But a lot. If something is easy and enjoyable, better double check if it is actually meaningful.
You can be the person that you always wanted to be, beginning right now.
Our identity is determined by how we behave, not what we have, or what other people think of us. A king in the middle ages didn't have a radiator, or an induction stove, or a microwave oven, or access to the vast knowledge available through the internet. He might have even had less sex, with an uglier wife, which might have been his cousin and an insufferable character, married because his parents said so. He didn't have proper health care, and he didn't have the liberty in his mind that were brought to us by the enlightenment. Your life is much better than even the life of kings five centuries ago.
On the other hand, what would you think of a disabled person, grown up in the slums? That has few material things, but behaves completely according to his convictions. Is diligent, honest, open, frugal, punctual and uses all his free time to study. And is mindful and hyperaware of his surroundings and his own feelings. He would still be the real deal. No matter what he has physically, or what other people think of him.
Living a good life has nothing to do with what you have and everything to do with what you do with the things that you have. Otherwise nobody could have lived a good life before the invention of the steam machine. Or the smartphone. Which would be absurd.
You might be under a lot of stress right now, but remember that we can only stress ourselves. It has something to do with our own expectations. The cure is not to aim lower. But to aim differently. We can't just say: "Oh, I will never be able to afford a house. So I just aim to be able to afford an apartment." This might turn out to become equally stressful, because we will notice that the apartment will not materialize out of thin air either, that we have to work for it, and make sacrifices, and even then its still not guaranteed. But we will think: "I already aimed lower, now I don't even achieve that. What a failure I am." But the aiming was just done wrong. Instead, we have to accept everything that happens to us. Everything from the environment that we can't control. It is could outside and we are freezing? Accept it. We don't get XYZ? Accept it. But on the other hand, we have to aim for a certain personality that we want to be. No matter the outer circumstances, we can be rich inside ourselves. We can behave like the person that we always wanted to be. We can act according to our convictions and believes. We can make it as nice for us as possible in the world that we live in. If your world consists of a small room, make this room as nice as possible. Don't aim for the best grade, aim for a good study session. Don't aim for a high paying job, aim for applying to many companies and preparing optimally for the interviews. Don't aim for wealth, aim for being as good as you can possibly become (not as good as somebody else might become). Aim for good and regular sleep, for regular exercising, for dinking 3 liters of clear tap water each day, and for a healthy diet.