I wouldn’t envy people for having those things OP. What really counts is good mental health. I know people with very little who are pretty happy. For example, I know a lady in her late 80s with no children, no siblings and no extended family. Her husband left her for another woman and she never re-married. Also, her only close friend recently died. On top of that, she has MS. But she’s surprisingly happy. She’s philosophical about dying, and believes that death is the end. So in a way there is no reason to feel sad. She’s leaving no one and nothing behind and will be kind of relieved to be gone.
On the other hand, having too much good fortune brings its own problems. If I had too much, I’d be terrified of losing it. And in a way I’d be right to be terrified. I never envy people who’ve got it all because I know it’s only a matter of time before something goes wrong. Sooner or later their partner will develop terminal cancer, or their dad will cheat on their mum, or their daughter will self-harm, or their best friend will get a job abroad, or nightmare neighbours will move in next door, or their business will go bust, or their new manager will turn out to be a bully, and so on. Life doesn’t stand still. Things constantly change, and the wheel of fortune turns. If you’ve got it all, the only way is down.
The people I really, really envy are the ones with inner peace and good mental health. I mean the strong, tough, insensitive people who find it easy to cope with trauma and who always bounce back from disaster. It would be silly to say that external things don’t make you happy. Obviously they do, to an extent. It’s better to have a detached house in a beautiful village, for example, than to live in a council bedsit on a horrible estate with feral *** next door. But for the average person happiness really does come from within.