Shiny Objects Quotes

“And yet Carter was spot-on when he told the American people, In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption. Human identity is no longer defined by what one does, but by what one owns. But we’ve discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning. We’ve learned that piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose. . . . This is not a message of happiness or reassurance, but it is the truth and it is a warning.40”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“Our souls hunger for meaning, for the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter, so that the world will be at least a little bit different for our having passed through it.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“It was Oscar Wilde who wrote, “In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.” Wilde was attempting to warn us that no matter how successful we are and how many possessions we accumulate, we will not be satisfied. Our souls hunger instead for meaning—a hunger that money and material possessions cannot satisfy.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“listen to what funny man and actor Jim Carrey had to say about fame and fortune: “I think everybody should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of so they can see that it’s not the answer.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“This suggests that happiness is a by-product of helping others rather than the result of its pursuit.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“It is the preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly. —HENRY DAVID THOREAU”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“How we spend our time plays an important role in our happiness. As we saw in chapter 1, happiness researcher Sonja Lyubomirsky suggests that engaging in experiential activities with family members accounts for approximately 50 percent of our well-being.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“once basic needs are met there’s no additional happiness with additional purchases.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“Recent research by Ed Diener, a leading happiness researcher, found that positive and negative affect, job satisfaction, and life satisfaction all level off when household income reaches $40,000–$60,000 per year.14 This is additional evidence that more money does not necessarily mean greater happiness.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

“We toss out 140 million cell phones each year, use 1 million brown-paper bags each hour (yes, hour), expend 1 million plastic cups on commercial airplanes every six hours, and run through 2 million petroleum-based plastic bottles every five minutes.”
― James A. Roberts, Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy