American Dream

The Declaration of Independence defined American Dreams as an individual to perceive a better, richer and healthier life. But as the culture changes the idea of American Dream has been modified. People now have a different perspective as the society changes people add more to the idea apart from just those three. The American Dream focuses more on an individual rather than the whole humanity. The principal element of the American Dream is only about how one person prosper his or her life. This shows that the affect of this declaration made people self-absorbed. Somehow, I agree with the statement made by Hulbert Selby.

Generally, American Dream make people put their interests before others. “By definition it must, because it nurtures everything except those things that are important :integrity, ethics, truth, our very heart and soul.” by Hulbert Selby. This quote explains that people give priority to things that are not that important. They ignore their conscious and go for the worldly objects. For example, the book Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom, describes that people pay too much attention on things that they consider important which they regret afterwards and try to get a chance to do things differently. For instance. Money, fame and success these are the main reason why people detach themselves from their soul and their inner voice. They talked about death, fear, aging, greed, marriage, family society, forgiveness and meaningful life. While talking about death, Morrie told Mitch that “once you learn how to die, you will learn how to live.” By this Morrie was trying to tell Mitch that if you accept the truth that you are going to die and overcome that fear than you can be more optimistic and will do the things differently. Hubert Selby is also explaining something similar to what Morrie said, in all our life we imagine ourselves and things that will benefits us, and to get to them we attempt any act possible. In this process we don’t realized the need of others, our life and goals matter the most. We close the our and our minds when it comes to others, those who need help or deserve happiness as much as we do.

Secondly, life is about helping others rather than spending your life contemplating about your wants and needs. American Dream is something that took people away from their perception as a community. It made people think as an individual due to which people struggled just for the items they want. They focused only on their lives. In his quotes, Hulbert Selby explain the same vision. He tells that getting all what you want is like living a lie which takes us away from our soul and our actual vision. I agree with this statement and to support it I will give a personal example. When I was in high school, all I cared about was my life, my grades and my future. I was a bright student which made me a little egocentric, taking good grades and not helping my fellow mates was my strategy. Once my father took me for a community service. It was an hospital for cancer patience. There I saw group of every age suffering from the same disease and I soon realized how selfish I am. I was provided by all the pleasures of life. And instead of giving back I started imaging that I own everything. My problems and my concerns looked minor and of no significance. Therefore, having your own vision is more important than following the trend of American Dream because it gives you a larger picture of who you are and what your goals should be.

On the contrary, American Dream does give you a path to start from. Before serving your community you should be strong enough to help the needy. Because, to aid someone is not a temporary, it should be the part of our life, a continuous help, a way of giving back to the society. there are many examples around us one of the most admirable is the step down of Bill gates from his own business. As all know Bills Gates is one of the richest entrepreneur known in this world. He invented Microsoft became a billionaire. He could have kept his status as a chairman of Microsoft. But instead of continuing his luxurious life he decided to give up the chair and become a full- time worker on the Bill and Melinda Gated Foundation. This is the way Bill Gates is trying to give back. Although he started from the road of American Dreams still he didn’t forget his vision and his actual purpose of life, which is to give not get.

Indeed, American Dreams do make us a little self- involved but if we don’t forget our primary purpose of life and stay motivated on our vision than our lives will much more than just ourselves. Helping others will give us self-satisfaction and sense of accomplishment. Which cannot be experienced just by getting things we need. “I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the community, and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.” by George Bernard Shaw.