30 Culture Shocks That People Didn’t Expect As They Turned From Poor To Rich

There’s nothing fun about growing up poor, and people who lived such a childhood will probably tell you that. As of 2022, 11.5% of the American population lived in poverty. But you can live above the poverty line and not have a comfortable life. In fact, 29% of working people in the U.S. say they struggle to cover basic needs.

The life of a person who lifted themselves from poverty can change noticeably, and sometimes in ways they don’t expect. One person online was curious to hear from the formerly poor, so they asked: “Redditors who grew [up] in poverty and are now rich, what’s the biggest shock about rich people you [have learned]?”

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30 Culture Shocks That People Didn’t Expect As They Turned From Poor To Rich Not. I'm not "rich rich", but my husband and I make well over a half million a year. That sounds like a lot until you learn that we live in Mountain View, California. He works at Stanford and I work for [social media company here]. We do well, we have no kids, and we save a lot of our income. I grew up super poor on and off until I was a late teen. Like, my father hunted for our protein and my grandma mended my brother's hand-me-downs for me. My husband grew up reasonably upper middle class, maybe bottom level of wealthy.

The biggest things I've learned?

(1) That "the desire to be rich one day" is itself a religion. A kind of religion. It's a dogma that we say prayers to. There are rituals around it. There's this almost spiritual believe in an "I'll be rich one day" afterlife of imagining one's post-scarcity paradise. In reality, once you get rid of all the things that drive you (by occupying much of your time and energy) you are left with your own demons. I'm a gay guy from one of the poorest parts of Ohio, and from a right-wing, Pentecostal family. Under normal circumstances, my needy kids, a job, a wife, and the stuff of life would keep my mind occupied. Freed of that, I've had time to unpack an incredibly painful childhood, which has not really been the paradise I hoped for.

Until I arrived at this place, this myth about "one day I'll be rich and happy when I have X amount of savings" was a lie. It was myth. It was like a religion that kept me working and kept driving me forward. One day, I reached the promised land and discovered that it's mostly sophistry. Happiness is the pursuit of happiness, it is in belonging to others, and in having a purpose to those we love.

(2) Miserable people are mostly miserable no matter what. Happy people tend to be happy no matter what. There are exceptions. Below a certain amount of income, the circumstances of life drain and destroy you. If you earn enough to "buy back" all that suffering (waiting in lines, crappy healthcare, clipping coupons, worrying about rent), what you're left with is a space where you can thrive. People born to be miserable c***s will be miserable no matter what. People who would be happy but can't because of poverty may probably thrive. And those who are happy will just be happy no matter what happens.

(3) Rich people, I mean REALLY rich people, really are different. Since I'm surrounded by SV wealth and have a few friends with 8 and 9 digit worth, they just are different. I have a friend in the 8-digit range. She is utterly obsessed with her "earthiness". "I'm just like everybody else." We were strolling down the street in San Francisco after lunch. She went on and on and on about how she's not disconnected from reality. Then, in one moment, she took a call from her husband, "Okay, well, just call 'Bob' and have him charter us a jet. We can get to Las Vegas in like an hour." I was like that Indian football coach meme staring at her. "Scuze me 'Marsha'. That statement was not a 'just like everybody else' statement. Next to nobody else ever says the words, 'Well, charter a jet' when getting to Vegas in under 4 hours becomes so inconvenient that they don't want to drive."

(4) No matter how rich you are, you are out of touch with some one struggling at a less entitled position as you. I'm not rich, but the luxuries to which I've become accustomed are hard for me to live without. (My husband works at a hospital and we have great [tech worker] insurance. So when we go to the hospital, we just go in and any doctor will see us. We fly mostly business class and anything other than that is quite literally painful.) Maybe you can't afford those things, but if --say-- you live in the US and have a house, food, clothing, and not much else, there's someone far worse off than you, somewhere on Earth. They're suffering. You're not. And the hardest thing about our reality is that there is only so much of our time and energy any one of us can spend thinking about it.

(5) The greatest joy you get from having money is the freedom from worry that it buys and the ability to do really great, kind things for your loved ones. It's nice being able to afford doing stuff for our friends and family. It's nice being able to not have to do so many of life's super annoying things. It's nice getting time away to go on vacation. Buying stuff? Not worth it for me. It's all about the time I get with my husband.

StilgarFifrawi , Mike González/Pexels (not the actual photo) Report

Final score:

85points

30 Culture Shocks That People Didn’t Expect As They Turned From Poor To Rich

Kornelija Viečaitė

Kornelija Viečaitė

Ilona Baliūnaitė

Ilona Baliūnaitė