Status Anxiety discusses the desire of people in many modern societies to "climb the social ladder" and the anxieties that result from a focus on how one is perceived by others. De Botton claims that chronic anxiety about status is an inevitable side effect of any democratic, ostensibly egalitarian society. De Botton lays out the causes of and solutions to status anxiety as follows:
Affluenza, a portmanteau of affluence and influenza, is a term used by critics of consumerism. Sources define this term as follows:
affluenza, n. a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more. (de Graaf [1])
"Banish the word 'struggle' from your attitude and your vocabulary. All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration.
We are the ones we have been waiting for." — Hopi elders
