From IIM Ahmedabad To Happiness

Author(s): Vijay K Jain
Publisher: Vikalp Printers

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FROM IIM-AHMEDABAD TO HAPPINESS
the life is dangerous; not knowing where to stop, you go on seeking and piling up wealth, till you kill yourself in its pursuit.
Let us elaborate on the differences between the two pursuits. The money-maker might have a large balance to his credit in one or more banks, he might be able to purchase all the paraphernalia of luxury which constitute the pleasure of the worldly-minded, but all this can he boast of at the cost of health, beauty and youth, to say nothing of true happiness, which, it would seem, is beyond his understanding. For while he has been busy in the pursuit of riches, dyspepsia, gout, hypertension, diabetes and rheumatism have been busy in their pursuit. By the time he lays his hold on money, they lay their hold on him. No one can, with impunity, spend hours of mental torture, or toss, night after night, in bed, in racking his brains for devising newer methods of amassing more gold, or of beating the competition. Mental anguish must leave its visible ugly marks behind, in the shape of a wrinkled forehead, distorted features, and wretched looks. The hair start thinning and losing their colour and lustre earlier than expected. In the longish run, the money-maker becomes a victim to all sorts of ghastly ar incurable diseases; he makes his pile, it is true; but it is not in his power to enjoy it. It is true that the man of money sleeps in his mansion, and his couch consists of the most luxurious bed that human ingenuity can devise, but it is no less true that he gets up in the morning carrying with him a hangover of unease.
The money-maker is eager to accumulate all the money he can, forgetting that it is neither the end nor the means for the realization of true happiness, but only a means for the procuring of those luxuries and accoutrements so often mistaken for ‘comfort and “status'. As the marginal utility of money decreases with its increase, the value of vast accumulation of money is, then, reduced to the satisfaction we feel in the idea of being considered rich by our neighbours and friends. The difference between the
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