Status Quo Journey

For many Americans the dream of education, family, buying a house, and success in a white collar career is the most sought after route because the societal values generations past have instilled in their children and their children did to their children thus continuing the cycle. The main reason that parents of a generation want their children to do better is to elevate the status of the family so that there is a natural ascension to the higher tier. If this elevation on a generational scale cannot be meet by the son or daughter then the burden of lack of self-worth fall upon them. When people start to believe that they have failed, they try to recapture their love and belonging to society by overstating their career, or wealth, or other aspects of …show more content…
There is a deep seated concept of fulfilling the familial/societal expectation which is conceived as the status quo. Certain types of people veer off the path of status quo and explore their individualism in order to find their passion which may contradict the standard dealt to them. Often times those who explore their individualism find what their role to humanity is and can attain a sense of belonging and mental happiness because they truly know who they are. This disrespect given to those not travelling a status quo journey is often times discourages this individualistic journey of each human to their own passions and causes a mass conformity which most of the population has to abide by .Throughout Death of a Salesman Arthur Miller presents Willy Loman as a middle class man who works hard but has to constantly dispense lies to his family and friends in order to maintain the image of ascending status. Through his portrayal of his complicated protagonist, Miller suggests that in order to appear to maintain a successful status as Willy Loman does, societal expectations force individuals to live in accordance with the social norm and not in terms of their own passions or