The American Dream: The Effects Of Stress On An Individual's Life

Many people have and are still coming to America, seeking this thing we once knew as the American dream. The American dream has been around since 1776 but was later coined in 1931. (Novak, 2015). Is the American dream still alive today? Is the American dream still worth pursing? Many people leave their homelands and come to America for what? Maybe a false dream that might not even still be alive today or even worth pursuing. Please take this journey with me through my paper to see if the American dream is still alive today. If it is, is the American dream even worth pursuing anymore?

It has been contended that the socioeconomics status of an individual does not impact the difficulty of hardships faced while striving towards the American Dream. In “The (futile) Pursuit of the American Dream”, Barbara Ehrenreich suggests “...while blue-collar poverty has become numbingly route, white-collar unemployment and the poverty that often results- remains a rude finger in the face of the American Dream.” To put succinctly Ehrenreich claims all who pursue the American Dream encounter the same difficult hardships. However, the socioeconomic status of an individual impacts the jobs the individual obtains, the education obtained, and ultimately the income of the individual; thus, impacting the difficulty of the hardships faced.

What the American Dream means to me is happiness. Being happy and not having to worry about food, shelter, and/or health. To have a healthy life, family, and relationships whether it be friends or family. To me the American Dream is not having a big house, nice car, or expensive clothing because I believe no matter how much material you have it will never bring you true happiness. “The most important thing is to enjoy your life - to be happy - it’s all that matters.” (Audrey Hepburn)

The Reality of an American Dream Do you believe that Americans still provide an access to the American Dream? From varieties of different perspective, successfulness has many different meanings that could include stable jobs and stable families. Those men who were married had the highest labor force participation of 74.6 percent. Also men who lives in North America has a highest employment rate of 52 percent. America still provides access to an American Dream to the “tired, poor, and the huddled masses.”

Some say the American Dream can be defined as being better off than your parent’s generation. Others may see it as the promise of riches and opportunity. But most agree that it is what immigrants come to America for. Personally, I believe it is meant to give everyone, no matter who they are, an equal opportunity to achieve success however they define it; to do so it embraces and upholds certain ideals and works to unite us a nation.

What is the American dream? The American dream is "that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement." - James Truslow Adams. The American dream can be defined in many different ways. Thus being, can people achieve their American dream? Many people could achieve the American dream through self determination and perseverance, but the American dream could be unachievable when facing financial obstacles or the costs of college.

Annotated Bibliography Cohen, M. (2014, April 26). The American Dream is now just that for its middle classes – a dream. The Guardian, p. 00. “The American Dream is now just that for its middle classes – a dream” by Michael Cohen explains the perception of Americans towards the decline of the middle class. The article details how the middle class was viewed before the elections of President Obama, and how it’s viewed after the creation of the Affordable Care Act.

Additionally, the death of the Original American Dream is shown through the increasing desire for materialism and excess. Myrtle’s love of materialism is what ruins her marriage with her husband and drives her toward death. When she first marries George, Myrtle believes that she is crazy about him, but she reveals, “The only crazy I was was when I married him. I knew right away I made a mistake. He borrowed somebody’s best suit to get married in, and never even told me about it…” (Fitzgerald 37). The article “How the American Dream Has Changed Over Time” explains:

The American Dream: Happiness The key to achieving the American dream is to live life happy. No matter if it is happiness with money, love, freedom, or safety all people deserve the American dream. Everyone has their own way of pursuing an "American dream". Many immigrants have come to America to pursue that dream.

The American Dream is being able to achieve whatever a citizen wants as long as they are willing to work hard for it; being financially stable is a key factor to being successful. This is the main reason many immigrants come to America. They want to start a life that allows them to build a family in a successful environment. The American Dream started in the early 1800s saying that anyone was able to achieve what they want as long as they worked hard and never gave up. America is one of the best countries to achieve the idea of “being successful.” Although there are many obstacles in life, the American Dream is pretty realistic.

The American Dream Is Achievable And Is Alive To begin with, for majority of the people it is an idea that every U.S citizen should have an equal opportunity to succeed and achieve through positive outcome such as hard work, determination, and initiative. What it means to me is everybody flourishing on the dreams they have in mind and living the life they want. For instance, the author, Adam Shepard, of the book “Scratch Beginning” had succeed on the american dream through positive outcomes when facing many adversity such as living in poverty. On the other hand, there are those who do not believe the american dream is achievable.

The current event that I feel affects today 's American Dream is high priced homes on the Market. I think that this is affecting the American Dream because infiltration of the house prices skyrocketing. The price of homes is so high because of the law of supply and demand, and the economy in San Diego. Houses being this high in price is forcing people to downgrade and live in a different neighborhoods. I think we can all agree part of the American Dream is to own your own home. With today 's market, it is hard to get a good and fair price on a home.

Everyone has a dream. Although these dreams aren’t the ones you have while sleeping, they are the ones that drive you, challenge you and keep you fighting for the reality that they will become true. They are the dreams that you will work hard for. Martin Luther King Jr. even died while fighting for his dream to become a reality. They are the ones you hope will one day become a reality. They are the dreams of a better education, better wages, better living conditions, equality, and they are the dreams of a better life. So then what exactly does the “American Dream” mean to people, how are these dreams achieved by those who are not native to our country, why do some people make it while others fail and who does the “The American Dream” really belong to?

Stress involves interaction of the person and environment. To quote a definition: “Stress is an adaptive response to an external situation that results in physical, psychological and / or behavioural deviations for organizational participants” (Luthans, 1998). Stress has generally been viewed as a set of neurological and physiological reactions that serves an adaptive function (Franken, 1994). Traditionally, stress research has been oriented toward studies involving the body's reaction to stress and the cognitive processes that influence the perception of stress. However, social perspectives of the stress response have noted that different people experiencing similar life conditions are not necessarily affected in the same manner (Pearlin, 1982).

Overall stress can make you an irritating or mean person to be around and this can affect students social lives in a negative