Simpleness

Consumerism is a word of delight to retailers and marketers, and the end of the World to those that buy in to it heavily. That is my view, yours may differ, but the culture of ‘what should I buy next’ has some fundamental flaws to its argument, not least that it carries with it the false idea of ‘enough’.

There is never a point where you feel you have enough, if you place more appreciation on getting what you haven’t got, rather than the wonder of what is already in your life. You are chasing a ficticious end-point of happiness, and the retail sector love that fact. They love that you’ll never stop buying. It gives them power.

Alongside the idea that ‘more is better’, comes the idea that functionality is no longer as important as the status message of what you buy, or how ‘beautiful’ your latest purchase is. We buy sofas worth thousands that are uncomfortable, expensive fast-food that does the total opposite of what food is meant to do (give us energy and sustenance).

We’ve been conned in to thinking that the more expensive something is, the better it will feel to own. I call bullshit.

A few simple ideas that may help:

1. Before buying something, ask yourself why you’re buying it. Whether it will, in reality, do what you ‘think’ it will do. Will that Big Mac give you the energy you need, or mask your hunger pains whilst filling you with needless genetically modified chemicals?
2. Take a look at all the things you own. Throw or sell the ones you haven’t or won’t use, and look at the rest. How else could you use them? Are they doing what the salesman promised?
3. Take a walk in the park, breathing in lots of fresh air and really looking around you. The miracle of trees and flowers, families playing. Compare how you would feel if this was taken away from you, as opposed to whatever-your-gadget-of-choice is.

Do you agree consumerism is making us forget the miracle of what we have already?

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