I really relate to this. Aside from having watched "lifestyle inflation" put people I know who make 7 figures a year into debt to their poorly chosen young ex-wives... I had a brief burst during the pandemic where I bought some wish list crazy stuff. A new guitar ($1300). A Roomba. A drawing tablet. A set of good wine glasses. A second car, one that was made after 1980 and doesn't fly off the road in the rain. And these things make you go, like - wow. This is a really well designed thing. It smells nice and feels solid in your hands. Shit, my life could be so much more enjoyable if my days and nights were spent touching these wonderfully designed objects, which I can afford to feel the pleasure of. Why do I deny myself the pleasure of having them? So I think the basic answer is that I don't want too much comfort in my life. Regardless of money. I think money corrupts by making you too comfortable, yeah, but my objection is more to the comfort than with the means to purchase it. Life should be a bit uncomfortable. Or very uncomfortable, when your 1980 Datsun is leaking freezing water and sliding across the freeway.

A lot of people seem to have the idea that being a full-grown human is being rich. To me, it's being able to plug all the holes in your own roof and always bearing in mind that we're just here for a limited period of time, to gain knowledge and experience, not things to make us lazy and comfortable. But maybe that's just like some weird post-religious self denial predilection I hold onto.