Morgan Erwin

Erica Plummer

English 11-8

23 September 2018

What is the American Dream?

When people think of the American Dream, they think of everything going perfectly and

everyone being completely happy because they’ve gotten what they want out of life. Although,

in reality, the American Dream is so much more than that. So, what exactly is the American

Dream anyways? When people think of the American Dream, I think they think of the “perfect

life”. Although, the perfect life can be so different for everybody so it’s so hard to define what

exactly the American Dream is. For example, for some people, the American Dream might be

becoming rich and famous and never having to work again a day in they’re life. While for other

people, the American Dream is being able to have the opportunity to go to school, go to work,

get a job, and work for the rest of their life. Although, even though the American Dream can

specifically be a lot of different things, there are a few things that it always seems to be. Those

things include a better, richer life with many great accomplishments. However, what do we

believe makes a person’s life more rich and full and how do we measure a person’s achievements

in life? I definitely think a richer, fuller life has to do with things like what kind of job we have,

how much money we make, the equality and opportunities we are given, and a person’s

achievements are based off of how much they have accomplished throughout their years and how

good they are doing in their lives.

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 To begin, I think a richer, fuller life is determined by things like how much money you

make, what kind of job you have, and the equality and opportunity a person is given to achieve

their dreams. I think that is really a big part of what people think about when they think of the

American Dream because those things are what people want in life. Everyone wants to be

comfortable with their money and be able to have a permanent job that they love and that will be

able to overal make them happy. Or maybe it’s just the opportunity to get a job and make your

own money. People want different things, but all people want to be happy and enjoy life, and

that’s a big part of the American Dream.

Next, people's achievements are measured on how much they have accomplished in life.

For example, if by the time a person is 80 and they have been able to have a good job that pays

well, started a family, lived in a beautiful house, been able to travel around the world, and more,

then they would be considered to have accomplished a lot in their life, and therefore, achieved a

lot as well. Achievements aren’t always necessarily actual awards given like a grammy, they can

be the awards that life just happens to give you too. They may be just the things that not

everyone gets to experience, such as happiness. And that’s what I think was also a big part the

American Dream as well. Being able to not only get actual, tangible award achievements, but to

also achieve the wonderful things throughout your whole lifetime.

In conclusion, the American Dream is really hard to define because it can be different for

each individual person depending on what they want out of life. Some people want to just do

nothing and have everything handed to them, while others want to be given that opportunity to

be able to do things that they never thought they’d be able to do. But overall, I think people came

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to American to be able to have a better, richer life and have many achievements. Or in other

words, to have the American Dream.