You’ve heard this one, I’m sure: Buy experiences, not things. Have you noticed how it’s always delivered with more than a hint of smug condescension? How it always seems to be a value judgment on the way you live your life?
It seems to me that the advice is almost always coming from two types of people: the extroverted, or the terminally online. The extrovert wants you to travel. Travel is the magic panacea to all of life’s problems. The very act of lugging your family around from one place to another provides enlightenment and is the key to a higher state of being. A friend once told me that I should travel more, because otherwise life “passes me by”. As if the fulfillment I get from my many hobbies is somehow inferior to the act of…walking around and seeing things.
What if I don’t like to travel? What if I abhor spending hours in airports or a car? What if seeing new places doesn’t attract me in the least? What if–gasp!–I’m not interested in experiencing other cultures up close? What if I don’t see my surroundings as something that I need to periodically escape from?
The terminally online thinks you should only own an iPhone and a Mac. Since that’s enough for them, because all they do is sit in front of a screen all day, then that should be enough for you too. Photos of empty studio apartments flood social media as if their owners have transcended the need for mere possessions, but all I see is the sterile environment of a shallow existence.
Screw all that. Don’t let anyone tell you the things that bring you joy are less valid than the ones that do the same for them. Things enable and predicate experiences. They become an extension of ourselves through which the experiences we can…well, experience, are expanded.
Be mindful of your consumption habits, and steer them in a direction that is good for your soul. Buy things that you will actually use. Prioritize those things that bring you real joy, as opposed to those that reinforce habits that are bad for you. Will the latest iPhone really bring you any more happiness than the one you currently have, or will it just enable you to doomscroll even more? A tablet that you can use to learn digital art might bring you more fulfilment. Or an e-reader might re-Kindle (see what I did there?) your love for books. Better yet, go analog, go tactile. Buy a bike, a skateboard, a guitar, a gun. Fuck it, buy all four if you can afford it and have the time to use them and the space to store them.
I think a better distinction can be made on the disposability of both experiences and things. Obviously this is a nebulous trait in the case of experiences versus tangible objects, but I’m sure you instinctively know what I’m talking about. Some experiences are hollow, just how some things are just dead weight that drag us down. Standing in a queue for hours in front of some tourist trap is not better than buying a frisbee and heading out to the park, just how buying the tenth damn Stanley cup will not bring you one iota of joy more than buying a theater ticket.