I also find that with social media, many people are dopamine addicted to the attention, doom consume and engage in representing their life online as a fantasy.
Certain lines have blurred a lot in the last few years.
It used to be fine living an online fantasy playing a character in an MMO. Now people live an online fantasy posting stuff on their social media and think it's normal. The blurring between these lines have been rapid IMO but with quick noticeable outcomes. I don't know if this is because reality tv has also contributed to making this normal, but I don't like it. I point this living a fantasy aspect out to others that I'm pretty sure can't handle it and remind them to spend money on things they actually like, not things they don't.
The conspicuous consumption/keeping up with the Joneses socially blending also messed up the difference between a need and a want. People then manufactured the idea that anything less than 2-3 out of town trips a year was inadequate. People would go from being satisfied to doing more because they were convinced doing more would make them more happy. I mean, it does mean you experience more happy... but there's diminishing returns on the satisfaction derived from subsequent trips while the cost is still directly incremental. You're kinda just paying to shuffle your day to day happiness into a concentrated time period.
It's almost like work too where some people come to me all excited about implementing new (to them) programs to have appropriate metrics and platform to increase productivity etc. and when I look at their situation, productivity decreases vs increases. What's the point of tracking your time to the minute when you don't actually need that information or review those metrics? You added time to keep track of it only to not use it. You were better off not tracking and working more. And many people underestimate upkeep time. I tell people if you use 10-20% of your daily time upkeeping the additional data in detail, you better derive more than 10-20% in productivity or it doesn't make sense. "No, no DoubleF, that's not how it works."
Many people forget to take a step back and understand why they do things. If the why you're doing it doesn't match whether it meets the intended mission, it might not be the right decision for you.
My 2024 resolution was purging. I intend to cut down the volume of all my possessions (digital or physical) by 20-30%. Some of it means consolidating multiple items into 1, replacing things I have into things that pack away well and some of it means just straight up purging stuff. It has been insanely satisfying when donating things, gifting excess things to friends/family and tossing things that are nice to have "in case" but honestly speaking it's pack rat stuff (useless, damaged, low quality back up tools etc.). I've also been trying to display more of the things I want to keep but don't use rather than leaving them in dark boxes. If it will sit in a dark box collecting dust, I have to default to consider donating it and really having a strong case to justify keeping it. It also forces me to either donate, gift or work on a back log. Some friends were elated to get gifts on things like Lego that I had intended to do, but had no time or appropriate space to display the final result. It was like two birds, one stone and it felt really good. The fact it's a proud display piece for them now is the cherry on top. It's getting the spot light it deserves and it's always fun to discuss it or hear them tell others it was a gift when I go over to their place. I also asked my wife to get me less useless knickknacks for occasions. Instead I've asked either for experiences to celebrate those or to combine those occasions into a single but perhaps better gift.
For me, I've noticed less is more.
I've also been very surprised how much more satisfaction I was deriving from these purges than I was expecting. "Oh ####, there's half a trunk load again!" It feels really damn good to see empty space in my home. Maybe because that space feels more like potential opportunities rather than clutter that represents failed attempts.