Contentment and a Wandering Heart

Public Market–Chaing Mai (© tkbeyond)

American culture is a funny thing—it's ironic. We have unparalleled liberty and prosperity, yet generally lack contentment as a people. Based on this, advertisers and public media have reaped multi-billion dollar revenues. We have so much and still want so much more. A good portion of the world's population wants what we have. When they can't have it they hate us for it, or want to destroy it. Who can blame them, really?

Take the current protests aimed at Wall Street. Our US Constitution guarantees freedom of rights (the 1st Amendment in Bill of Rights). Of course, a segment of our population wants to shut them up, and another group wants to ride the wave of their sentiment. But, so far, what they want isn't clear except some form of access to greater wealth—envy and discontent (greed) protests greed.