My college teacher of a salesmanship class once said, “The strongest human motivation is the desire to be superior. Play to that emotion as a salesperson and you’ll always have a job.” We see this emotion being played day in and out in our advertising and merchandising circles. And if we’re naive enough to judge our superiority or equality by the hollow gauge of what we show on our backs or in our driveways, then we (literally) pay the price.

Many of us have a little touch of Jones Mania. With some, it's an obsession we must satisfy by keeping up with our Jones friends. With others, it’s just a bug that causes unnecessary envy. The lucky ones eventually cure themselves when they finally question if the pressure of keeping up with all the other patients in the Jones ward is worth the price. But the unlucky ones just keep digging themselves deeper into their pit.

Having nice things won’t necessarily drive us into the financial pits as long as it doesn’t become an obsession. If we keep all the material business in balance with the other slices of our life, there can be much to enjoy. It's OK to savor an exquisite meal or feel good in a $500 dress or sport coat. We just need to avoid the temptations created by all the merchants, advertisers and salespeople that encourage us to spend more than we have to appear more prosperous than we really are.

The Real Cause of Jones Mania

It’s not always what the Jones folks have that make people want to keep up with them, but the way some of the Jones display it. Many of the finest and most humble people I know are quite wealthy. But instead of getting in your face about how much harder they worked than others, or the sacrifices they made to get what they have, they’ll usually tell you how much they’ve been blessed, had good timing or were just plain lucky. They make it a point to let people know that they’re no better than anyone else.

They are people who know the true source of their material blessings. They continually give God their most humble and devout thanks, which 

makes them deserving to receive even greater blessings. They are living proof that you don’t have to be a poor and downtrodden nobody to have a close relationship with God.

It’s those who come into a windfall, get a huge bonus check or suddenly multiply their income and publicly pat themselves on the back who cause others to envy, or sometimes even despise them. It’s “Dem Dry Jones” — those boring folks who forever talk about their stuff, their kids at Dartmouth, their beachside condo or their latest stock market hit that stir up those evil spirits of envy and one-upmanship within us. And if they can’t top you themselves, they often have a friend or relative who can as in “My niece makes $300,000 a year" or the like.

It's also a chuckle to watch people mask their true reasons for buying costly things by describing how their “$60,000 Mercedes is safe for their family” or their “$3,000 couch is more durable.” The smaller they are inside, the bigger they need to act outside.

What a better world we'd be part of if more of us could look down the ladder with thanks more often than up the ladder with envy.