Quote: Dolly Dagger @ April 14 2009, 11:13 AM BSTPlus you have a partner and (I presume?) children - you're already luckier than a lot of people out there!
Nicely Put Miss Dagger 
Sibling Rivalry Page 2
Quote: Marc P @ April 14 2009, 11:16 AM BSTMoney can't buy happiness but it can as sure as hell rent it.
I believe Burt Reynolds put it better when he said, "I've been miserable and poor and I've been miserable and rich. Miserable and rich is better." 
Quote: chipolata @ April 14 2009, 11:15 AM BSTHaving children makes him unluckier in my eyes. Give me a fancy new laptop over kids any day of the week.
Agreed.
Quote: Matthew Stott @ April 14 2009, 11:25 AM BSTAgreed.
Ah, but a laptop isn't going to look after you when you're old.
I am seen as the good one... my sister has made a lot of mistakes. However, put into perspective, we're both pretty good people in this world.
My sister has always competed with me, but I think a lot of that has come with my being older.
My brother is 14 years younger than me, so doesn't really have to compete.
14 years younger? 14 years younger than me is still 26 which I suspect is still 'considerably older than yow'
In the words of Robbie Williams "Youth is wasted on the young, before you know it's come and gone"
Never a truer word said so I urge all of you in your 20s not to waste a moment because it disappears all the quicker once you pass 30.
My brother was one of those kids that didn't have to work hard to get what he wanted. A little effort gave him high marks in advanced classes.
Meanwhile I was so terrible at school my parents would congratulate me for just passing a class.
It's taken a lot of time and effort but I'll soon be at the same level of him....and he's actually my younger brother!
I have no brothers or sisters to compete with. I have no idea what my friends earn and I don't care. I've been told umpteen times to go for promotion in work but I like my life as it is. I have enough money to do most of the things I want (without going cwazy) and I know if I went for promotion and got it that would be the end of any writing I do because the job would be coming home with me.
I very rarely go on holiday because it's not a tangible expense. If I want a good time I'll go walking in the mountains and occasionally take in a concert. I go out with my mates a lot on weekends.
I'm divorced but do have two children and when I'm with them I don't go out unless they're with me (except for a short run maybe). That is a restriction I bought into some years ago.
So I re-iterate what has been said. Take the positives of what you've got and work on the things you love to work on (such as writing I guess). That is all. 
Quote: Tuumble @ April 14 2009, 12:09 PM BSTNever a truer word said so I urge all of you in your 20s not to waste a moment because it disappears all the quicker once you pass 30.
Disagree Tumble. I'm having a good as time now as ever I did in my 20's. If you have your health mate the worlds your lobster, you just have to work at it. (I'm 45 by the way)
I have two younger sisters - one has her own hairdressing shop and the other's an office manager. I was always the black sheep of the family, lurching from one disastrous crap job into another.
I think I was at my lowest point in '95 / '96 when my girlfriend had dumped me because she was sick of my tossy ways, and I found myself living on the 11th floor of a scummy high rise on a council sink estate surrounded by prossies and drug dealers - on the dole and nothing really to get up in the morning for. I was so skint one week that the only thing I had to eat in the flat was a box of Paxo stuffing and some cornflakes. I made them last 4 days before I had to walk 6 miles to the dole office and get a crisis loan. I had to sit in a roomful of chavs and scum and piss-smelling tramps for almost 6 hours to get a giro for £32. I think I spent a tenner on food and the rest went down my neck in beer to dull the depression.
Then out of sheer desperation I decided to stop applying for shit jobs in factories etc, and throw all my efforts at writing, which was really the only thing I enjoyed doing (apart from shagging and getting pissed which you can't really get paid for).
Small trickles of money started coming in and even though I was still skint I was much, much happier doing a job I liked. Then luckily a few years later that small trickle of money became a steady(ish) stream, which allowed me to buy a place of my own and finally call myself "a writer".
That stream is yet to become an ocean of cash, (and I doubt it ever will) but the one thing I've learned is that we're all given some sort of talent, and if you can somehow steer your life to make a living out of that talent, you'll be a hundred times happier because you're doing what you were put here to do.
Keep your chin up mate - and start making positive decisions about your future happiness. If you want it you can have it.
Quote: Tuumble @ April 14 2009, 12:09 PM BSTNever a truer word said so I urge all of you in your 20s not to waste a moment because it disappears all the quicker once you pass 30.
I don't waste a single moment...
I do sometimes wonder what I'm doing working here in the UK though... my chance to work in NZ is slowly slipping away.
Quote: EllieJP @ April 14 2009, 12:23 PM BST... my chance to work in NZ is slowly slipping away.
Don't go unless it's a much better job than you've got now. The grass is not always greener on the other side. One of the teachers in school emigrated to NZ and was back in 6 months. Hated it!
Plus Aaron will miss you and it's an awful long way for a BSG meet up.
Who was it who said: "To succeed is not enough, you have to see other people fail."?
As for money, Spike Milligan said: "Money can't buy you happiness but it does bring you a more pleasant form of misery."
Quote: Lee Henman @ April 14 2009, 12:22 PM BSTThat stream is yet to become an ocean of cash...
Just in case it does become an ocean of cash, perhaps you could consider hiring retarded guys named Kenneth?
Quote: roscoff @ April 14 2009, 12:33 PM BSTDon't go unless it's a much better job than you've got now. The grass is not always greener on the other side. One of the teachers in school emigrated to NZ and was back in 6 months. Hated it!
I was in NZ for 4 months in 2007 and loved it, but couldn't work. Would like to go back for a year.
Quote: EllieJP @ April 14 2009, 12:23 PM BSTmy chance to work in NZ is slowly slipping away.
NZ is over-rated and isn't going to go up in smoke or revolution any time soon. Many NZers try to leave to work abroad. A lot of them only get as far as Australia, poor things.
Quote: EllieJP @ April 14 2009, 12:38 PM BSTI was in NZ for 4 months in 2007 and loved it, but couldn't work. Would like to go back for a year.
Um, no idea where you're at or what you're doing (and it's none of my business) - but if you travel the world in your 20s and do all sorts of different jobs in different countries, you might end up finding something that's fun and pays well. But generally it's wiser to study, get the relevant degree(s), get into your chosen industry/field, work your way up to a high-paying job, eventually get promoted, get rich - and then do the world travel bit when in your 30s. Perhaps. Oops! By which time in your 30s you may be married with young kids, leaving you unable to indulge in lengthy globe-trotting. In which case save the globe-trotting for the 40s.
Quote: Kenneth @ April 14 2009, 12:48 PM BSTNZ is over-rated and isn't going to go up in smoke or revolution any time soon. Many NZers try to leave to work abroad. A lot of them only get as far as Australia, poor things.
Australia is the most over rated place in the world, everyone was jogging the whole time, yuk!