Am I Luxury?

Good reflection.

You may not be "luxury" but you are definitely #enough. 💯

No, you are borderline poor just like the majority of us. Only royalty and overpaid celebrities know true luxury, the rest of us just have lives.

As someone who also struggles with depression I understand the need to fill that god-shaped hole with tchotchkes, hence the watches and the books before that and the comics before that and whatever else will replace watches after watches no longer suit. Luxury is a dirty game that means absolutely nothing at the end of the day. None of my hobbies make life worth living. We can find that in friends, family and purpose. We try anyway.

By the way, I too didn't finish university and in a third world country that's like double the hardship. All we can do it play the cards we've been dealt.

Best of luck, friend. Here's to a luxurious 2024.

You are luxury. The average individual global income in 2023 was just under $10,000. Over 1.6 billion people in the world lack adequate housing. For most of the world, less than 5 marriages per 1000 people get married a year.

I know, it is hard to think globally, but in many ways you are living a life of luxury and based on your post, have over come many challenges to get there. Remember, you are your own barometer and everything else, including this reply is noise. If you are happy, own it and take comfort in all you have vs. do not.

Not me, I also have avocado toast. Checkmate, atheists.

It just happens that everyone stands on different positions in life. Some are way luckier & wealthier than others, it's just the way it is. The important thing IMHO is to get our priorities straight & live within our capabilities. If we don't have the same financial abilities like the luckier & wealthier then we would be wise to avoid their standard of living.

Just an example: I'm living paycheck to paycheck as a middle class worker in a developing country. I have to prioritize the survival of my family (food, schooling, insurance, utility bills, etc). I had to flip my previous watches several times while saving for a couple of years just to be able to get my current watch at $300 price tag.. and it's the only ONE watch I have. So you understand how I stand on the global financial spectrum. It will take me quite some time just to save & buy a San Martin homage of Tudor Ranger. I really itch for a Tudor Ranger, but buying one will literally cost me an arm or a leg or a kidney.. you get my point. Nevertheless I enjoy opening WC & looking at people's wonderful collections & posts everyday.

Is it wrong to itch for cool high-end watches? Not at all. Everyone can pursue whatever they desire, as long as they don't sacrifice the real priorities (spouse, kids, the bills.. you get my point) along the way. So in my POV, luxury is something we measure by comparing the price of the watch with our own financial capabilities. The same watch can be a luxury for some but also a common watch for others. As long as we don't try to live other people's standard of living we should be fine 🍻

I don’t think an individual can be luxury but can live in what others may perceive as luxury. A bit like time, it’s relative to the observer.

I would define a luxury as a treat I want but do not need or an essential that I may struggle to afford, and to obtain it isn’t going to be easy; it may require saving or compromise, or at least some thought. Once something loses that, if I know I can afford it and buy without thinking about it, it is not a luxury and more a routine item for me, but others in a different set of circumstances may still see those things as luxury. Similarly, there are things others have which will seem normal and routine to them but are luxurious to me.

Unlike @ayadai, who seems to be able to dismiss the concept of your article based on what presumably is a simple copy and paste error, I kind of understand your thinking. I think you're possibly luxury in relation to others (in their eyes), but see yourself as non luxury if you benchmark against wealthier or more priveleged people. It's all relative, my friend. And ultimately it's irrelevant if you can find some sort of equilibrium mentally. You're luxury enough for me.

Comparing our situation to those of poverty-stricken third world countries, we will always be in relative luxury.

In the context of living in London (or similar cities) luxury is almost synonymous with excess. I can buy a coat for £30/£50/£100/£1000 etc. where does luxury begin? Same can be applied to watches but I think luxury products sit just that level above your comfort zone in spending. Where you feel you’ve pushed the boat out for that little extra quality/brand/status whatever it is.

I understand your article and I agree in part. In the eyes of a large amount of the world, you live in luxury. As an American, you are just getting by enough to be comfortable. It's always about perspective. There is never any clear cut answer to these questions. Even those who we may consider luxury lust and fawn over what those of more means are able to attain. There never seems to be an end goal in it all.

Yes, yes you are luxury and here's why.

"The problem for me is that I haven’t done the work to have earned being luxury. My dad died the week I graduated from high school. My mom died 5 years later. I was (probably still am) depressed. I tried college (online), but due to several things, I never finished. I got divorced, went basically homeless for a few years & then by the grace of God got remarried & started digging out of the hole. I lost a lot of time to build my foundation. I’ll probably never retire."

That is what makes you luxury. You didn't give up, you didn't cave in, you didn't just decide to live off other people's work, you took responsibility for your own life and started working your way out.

Believe me when I tell you I know first hand how dark things can get before they turnaround. You will get there. You have that foundation now. Just continue to remember "I AM worth it, I work damn hard for every penny and I'm not going to settle".

Let's dissect the definition and we can come up with a definite answer.

Merriam-Webster defines it thus: 1: a condition of comfort:

- I'm sure you are comfortable! 🤩On the couch, feeling cozy. Your wife nestled in your arms. Fire crackling in the fire place. That to me spells comfort. 2a: something adding to pleasure but not absolutely necessary:

- I would ask your wife this🤫. You must add to her pleasure sometimes... And alot of times, women don't need us. So we are not always necessary. 2b: an indulgence in something that provides pleasure, satisfaction, or ease:

- Do you provide pleasure and satisfaction? Yes... Yes you do! 😈 And... whether you like it or not, your blog article provides a certain pleasure to many other people that may indulge in your words. Plus you seem like an easy going type of guy.

Therefore, YOU ARE LUXURY!!

Now what does Luxurious mean...

By the way, great article! Very nicely written. I don't care what others say. You Sir, are talented writer! Please share with us more of these posts. They will be read with enthusiasm!

Ive got a few other ideas. Trying to space them out and fine tune them.

I'm genuinely excited to see what comes next! Keep me posted

The fact that you are asking yourself the question makes you luxury. (While it is not the easiest read, this paper on social class and conspicuous consumption sheds some light on it.)

Good article. I know I'm not luxury but enjoy the watches on that level.

I got to this post a few days late. It is interesting and thought provoking excellent writing. Everyone is different but for me luxury means the top end of what you can afford, at a big push. Over that is just nonsensical. I can give you an example. I saved years for a Rolex and it is great, its 18 years old now and I have worn it maybe 40 times. It was not sensible to pay that much for a watch. I overstretched. I get more pleasure now from my Casio Oceanus that was £450, and still expensive for me, but within my range. Luxury can also mean a really nice sandwich sitting in a park bench looking at beautiful scenery or sky.

Definition of luxury no. 1: "A condition of abundance, or great ease and comfort."

Not the greatest definition. Although you can suffer from not having enough, you can also suffer from abundance. And too much comfort will bring you down long before too much hardship will.

In the presently ruined U.S. economy, a really nice sandwich is now indeed a luxury. I don't agree though that looking at a beautiful sky is a luxury, because that's available to everyone. It doesn't cost any money to use your eyes (yet).

I worded it wrong, I could have expressed myself better. I was trying to say that a nice view and decent butty are one of life pleasures.

In this nauseatingly Politically Correct Era, somebody needs to come right out and say it. This whole Luxury issue is the Woman's fault. The prehistoric caveman didn't want luxury. All he needed was a club, a loincloth, and a few sticks to make a fire. He communicated in monosyllabic grunts. Then he found that he did in fact need a woman, but it was all over when he dragged her by the hair back to his cave. He thought they would simply do what they needed to do and that would be it. No. Suddenly, he saw his man cave fill up with chintz and ornamentation. Lace doilies and throw pillows. Figurines and Thomas Kinkade cave paintings. And unlike the man, who only spoke when necessary and in grunts of one syllable or less, the woman NEVER SHUT UP and started using 'sentences' like "We can't afford it" or "You never take me anywhere" or "You're not wearing that loincloth out to dinner, are you?"

I saw all of this on the recently unearthed You Tube video, but I had already suspected this was the way it happened.

I like what you wrote and how you expressed yourself on that article. Luxury for me when it came to watches growing up anything with a shiny or elastic mental band whether it be a quartz Timex or even on of those fancy shiny fashion watches. For me that was cool and luxurious. I would style it well as long that it tells the time. That’s what matters! Oh how nice it be if we all had unlimited amount of money and buy the best luxuries time pieces that we all like and love. Then the worry and stress that comes with it if it breaks or get stolen. Live by means be great full and enjoy what we have even if we work extra hard to earn even better. Outside a watch can be Luxurious if doesn’t work then what? It’s considered junk if it’s not fixable. But what’s in the inside and how it tells time now that’s true luxury!

Thank you for linking the bootstrap article. Some of the author's points were worthwhile. But was he jousting windmills?

I've never liked the expression to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. It sounds so antiquated, like something out of a Charles Dickens story (although he did work in a shoe polish factory as a child). And as the author states, it's flawed. But almost everybody knows the meaning behind it, that you have to take the first step, put on your shoes, and then pull yourself up by your bootstraps. A better objection I've heard is that some don't have any shoes, and therefore no bootstraps to pull on. You can, and should, provide them with shoes, but then they have to go walk in them. I have worked with people in my city for six years and our churches and charitable organizations have provided plenty of actual physical shoes and maps to food and job and church resources, all within literal walking distance. A few have walked, or driven the four or five blocks there and have indeed achieved some success. But most haven't.

I won't go deep into this in this space, but I could. I can only speak for my own city, and here it's nothing more than a dumb dreary generational cycle. I'm working with people who grew up in one or no parent baby daddy families, where they think they can't hit bottom, and will always be bailed out. This has been going on for about sixty years now. Well why wouldn't people in 2023 think this way? That's all they've ever known.

Where I thought the Forbes author was on his horse with his lance was that he constructed this whole entrepreneurial model off of the bootstrap expression. Fair enough, Forbes is in fact a business magazine. His point that too much self reliance eventually won't work is true, but it's also obvious. Connection, connection, connection! This conversation actually takes place in people's homes. I start it off. "Do you have any family?"

"Well, there's my brother, but I'm mad at him."

"Do you get along with your neighbors?"

"No, we don't speak."

"Do you belong to a church?"

"No."

"How about some kind of civic organization?"

"I don't know what that is."

Me: "Well no wonder you're in trouble and called us. You're going through this all alone!"

Luckily, our city is full of wonderful resources of meaningful work and spiritual and civic connection. I'm glad they exist, but I'm only 51% glad they exist and 49% disgusted that they need to exist.

But thanks again for linking the Forbes article. There is a great sentence in it that already shows me a mistake I have made with people. The sentence is this: "There is a large gap between ability and competency." I realize now that I have directed some people to the wrong places that they weren't suited for because I thought they just needed to work harder and . . . pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

I would like to purge the bootstrap expression and replace it with something like "Put on your shoes" but even though I think it's more accurate, it doesn't have that snarky, know-it-all superior ring. But I'm sticking to it. Put on your shoes and find some connections. Put on your shoes and start running. The player the crowd cheers for is the one running with the ball. And barefoot people have no impact on our society.

"Comparison is the thief of joy" and in the words of Baz Luhrman "...the race is long but in the end it is only with yourself."

Wearing a Rolex doesn't make one extraordinary nor does wearing a Casio make one noble. It's all just stuff.