There is no end to the debate whether the rich or the poor is happier. People on both sides of the debate tended to see things at the extremes and treat wealth and happiness as mutually exclusive. We all know this is not so in real life. The rich can be happy, just as the poor can also find happiness in non fiduciary aspects.
For me, believe it or not, every time I have a bad at the office, I will come home, take a look at my little excel sheet detailing my investments, net worth and passive income, and I will be at peace.
More than a decade ago when I found myself at a cross road in my career, it dawn on me that I better not just depend on my job for income. That was when I started investing in earnest. It helped that my wife was a career woman. Together our combined income allowed us to consistently save and invest every year. Our dividend income was very modest at the beginning and now we are getting $40k per year (give or take a thousand or two year on year).
To spread our risk, we also invested in a condo for rental income generating another $45.6k per year (gross). On top of that, we are also getting interest from our
CPF of about $20K per year. We cannot draw out the
CPF interest as we are not yet 55, but the thought of having yearly interest coming in has a very calming effect for us.
We were looking forward to retiring by 55, but not so now. Each time we reviewed our net worth and investment income, we get this satisfied and happy feeling that we will be alright. We joked that it has become the anti-dote to office stress.
So I guess my point is, building up your wealth can be a good thing if you take a positive mindset to it, and not be overly obsessed by it.