What Do You Have To Show For It?

How to avoid the unwinnable game of endless consumption and set your own rules for life.

If you're even remotely interested in starting a business some day, you need to understand when you're in a consumption mindset and a creative mindset. After all, your mind is your core asset, and you're going to need to do a lot of creating as you build your business. You're also going to need resources that provide you an ample runway to get started.

These resources–time and money–are under constant attack from an endless list of institutions that covet them. They play games with you and everyone else in an attempt to gain possession of your resources. Perhaps you could endure that game in your past. But, if you value flexibility, options, and freedom, you're going to need to get one thing straight about the battle you're about to face:

Consumption rules the day.

It's the bedrock of our modern economies. Corporations accumulate billions through the active consumption of the masses.

When you buy new shoes, the company gets one more sale. Increased sales means increased production. Increased production requires increased employment. Increased employment creates increased income for the workers. Increased income for the workers means they can spend more money. Leading to? You got it: increased consumption.

The opposite is true, as well. When sales fall, everything else on the list above falls.

I'm not putting a moral value on this. It's easy to criticize the idea of consumption, given that most consumed goods aren't technically needed for our survival. Nevertheless, consumption has helped raise the standard of living for most people around the world. Meanwhile, it's given birth to some negative side effects.

Here's the thing about consumption: You don't have the resources to endlessly consume. Even billionaires would eventually run out of money if they consumed beyond their means. Your consumption is dependent on your available resources and whatever debt you have available to you. Hopefully, you have figured out how to manage this, and you're not consuming your way into crippling debt.

In a world that mails you endless new credit card offers, this is not as easy as it sounds.

We are exposed to a never-ending message of BUY, BUY, BUY! Even if you're a pro at minimizing your consumption, you're still being bombarded with marketing messages from the millions of companies who desire your hard-earned money. This endless onslaught of persuasive messaging puts us in a reactive state. We become aware of what's available through the marketing, then we react by ultimately deciding what to buy and what not to buy.

The primary side effect of this 24/7 broadcasting into our brains is this: a state of mind that focuses on consuming. This is where we run into a problem. When we're in a consumption mindset, we cannot leverage a creative mindset. Think about it this way: You cannot read and write at the same time. You can do each on its own with no problem. But, you can't do them simultaneously.

Let's examine why getting stuck in a consumption mindset can lead to a bottomless pit of meaningless transactions.

Consumption

Consumption is a state of taking in something from an external source. These sources can be ideas and/or goods. Regardless of what you're consuming, the modern state of consumption is built upon a couple fundamental truths.

Consumption requires compensation

When you consume, you engage in a transaction. You pay for new shoes with money. You get the shoes, they get the money. You also consume ideas. This exchange also requires compensation. You pay with your attention and time and they get your mind via beliefs, assumptions, and behaviors. Their goal is to leverage your mind so they can ultimately influence you. Most of the time, they want to influence you to buy something. Other times, they want you to provide them power in the form of your support.

Regardless, you're paying with your time, money, and mind. Eventually, these can be fully depleted. Not where you want to be...

Consumption is reactive

When consuming, we wait for someone else to present our options, then we choose accordingly. Do you want pizza or do you want a sandwich? If those are your only two options, it doesn't matter if you feel like a salad. You have your choices, now it's your turn to react. Your mind is purposely funneled to the point of a simple choice. This is, after all, how humans solve problems. We whittle down our options to the last two, then choose the one we find best. The goal of the advertiser is to get you to this point without considering anything other than the choices presented. This illusion of choice helps convince us that we were, in fact, completely proactive in the process. This helps us look ourselves in the mirror without breaking down the next morning.

Consumption is easy

The fundamentally reactive state of consumption requires almost no work at the moment of purchase. You just click the Buy Now button, and soon you'll magically have shoes on your doorstep. The money you used that allowed you consume the product took work, of course, but that's not at the front of your mind. In fact, you can even spend money you don't yet have by using credit cards. Don't we have to pay that money back at some point? Who cares!? That's not my problem right now. Those shoes are going to make me so popular!

The same goes for the consumption of ideas. It takes no effort whatsoever to be told that a pair of shoes are the hottest ones on the market and you'll instantly gain status by wearing them. It takes no effort to consume the latest headline about the latest thing and have the appropriate emotional response. It takes no effort to be told that God is a man with a white beard who lives in the clouds. The downstream effects of consuming these ideas don't matter to you at the point of consumption. You only care about the immediate trade-off, which is almost always promising you some short-term benefit.

This quick-exchange model implies that we can obtain something without the effort that would normally be required to earn it. By the time the transaction comes around, we have forgotten how much work it took us to earn the money we use to make the purchase. We just feel that card in our hand and know that we're one swipe or one click away from getting that object of our desire.

Consumption provides a solution to a problem

In its "natural" state, consumption is simple: You're hungry, so you eat. Your problem, hunger, is solved by procuring some food so you can eat it. Maybe winter is coming. You need to gather firewood, furs, and food so you won't die. This might seem a bit simplistic, but the roots of consumption are not all that complicated. It's simply a solution to a problem.

Institutions haven't forgotten the roots of consumption. They leverage the problem/solution framework to persuade you to consume goods far beyond what you actually need.

Want a quick MBA in how advertising works? Here you go, in a nutshell: First, advertising creates a problem for you. It shows you sexy/smart/high-status people engaging the product. But, you don't have the product, so you aren't as sexy/smart/high-status as you would be if you did have the product. This is a problem.

Don't despair! We have the solution! Just swipe that credit card, buddy, and your problem is solved!

Understand these fundamentals, and you'll begin to see the obvious dangers of being stuck in a consumption mindset. Remember: there is no end to the list of products, services, and ideas that can be marketed to you. You could drain the entire GDP of any modern nation and still not be able to consume everything pushed on you.

A watch is not a watch

Most humans are in a constant state of consumption. Ironically, their lives are consumed by a desire to consume. It's a constant game of what to buy next and what the product or idea will do for them. Most of the time, the product provides some amount of utility for them. A Rolex does, after all, keep time.

But, we are often consuming an idea along with these objects. In the case of the Rolex, we're buying perceived status. Rolex knows that you can buy a watch that keeps time just as well for a fraction of the cost. So, they appeal to other desires that can be attached to the product. In other words, they know that their customer isn't buying utility - the act of keeping time. Their customer is buying status.

The watch is just the vehicle for this status.

Think of any advertisement you've ever seen that included a famous person or athlete. You want to be cool and smooth and attractive like Matthew McConaughey, don't you? Just roll in a Lincoln, and it's all yours.

These are just a few examples. The list of goods is endless. The pressure from advertisers is endless. The number of ideas we can attach to the goods is endless. They will never stop. Does this sound like a problem?

If you remember that the consumptive mind blocks the creative mind, then yeah.

If we do not consciously decide to get out of the consumption state of mind, how will we ever find time to create? And, where does life lead if you're not creating?

The endless hamster wheel of consumption

If you're a typical consumer, you're going to accumulate a lot of stuff. At the moment you bought these things, you got trendy shoes, trendy clothes, trendy home decor, the latest tech. That new car smells oh-so-good rolling off the lot.

After a few months or so? Guess who's advertising the latest shoes? The latest clothes? The latest home decor? The new tech? The latest model of the same car you just bought? Now, that trendy stuff you had isn't so trendy anymore. It's not so new anymore. You bought them to stay up with the latest trends, but the trends changed! And, even the tech that you later used to justify your purchase has been improved! Damn, foiled again!

You've accumulated all this stuff. You filled your home and life to the brim with stuff. And, now, it doesn't provide you the satisfaction it once did. The shine is wearing off.

Because your intent was not utility, but to stay on top of the trend, you've boxed yourself into a corner. But, by the grace of God, you have a means of escape! You guessed it: keep buying the new stuff.

But, you still have the old stuff! What's it worth? Probably very little or nothing. Calculate the time you have to spend in dealing with it, and it's certainly costing you. You've probably even felt guilt and frustration when you finally KonMaried a once-desired object into the trash can.

Over time, this cycle leaves you feeling like you have nothing to show for it. You just have constantly aging stuff that gnaws at you. You have to manage it and you don't even really want it anymore. You really want the newest thing! You're stuck in the never-ending hamster wheel of consumption.

Oh, and by the way, I haven't even approached the topic of consuming entertainment yet. If you weren't already depressed, buckle up, baby!

But wait, it gets worse

How many hours do you think most people spend watching shows or sports, looking at their phones, or otherwise engaging in some form of external information being fed to them through screens? If you answered, "a shit-ton," congratulations!

After a year of this spoon-fed content, what do you have to show for it? You got a little thrill from that last Netflix series? A good laugh from the cat video? Some really great water cooler conversations? The delight of the emotional roller-coaster that is modern sports entertainment? Some intense hand-wringing about the latest war/famine/tragedy in a place you can't even find on a map?

You spent all this time consuming what these screens spewed out, and you have basically nothing of value show for it. Like the debt left over from buying all the crap you didn't need, you're left with the equivalent of mental debt: anxiety, depression, and a feeling of hopelessness.

That sucks, right? You wake up one day to realize you're stuck on their never-ending tilt-a-whirl ride of consumption and you can't make it stop. But, at least you're waking up. You ask yourself: What could I have been doing with all that time? What could I have been doing with the money I spent on crap I didn't need?

Exactly what they don't want you to do. The one thing that takes you out of the consumption mindset. The thing that costs them billions. What they fear the most:

You could have been creating.

You could have been painting.

You could have been writing.

You could have been getting really good at photography.

You could have been learning a musical instrument.

You could have been practicing whatever skill made you happy to practice.

You could have been creating a body that was strong and fit and healthy.

You could have been creating memories with people you love.

You could have been exploring new ideas that broaden your horizons.

You could have been traveling and experiencing life for real.

You could have been practicing new skills that gave you more opportunities in life.

You could have been enjoying time in nature that fulfills you and breathes new ideas into your soul.

You could have been creating a side gig that ultimately sets you free.

You get the idea.

By the end of a year of doing these things, you'd have new skills, new perspectives, a healthy mind and body, activities that enriched your human experience. You would not only have the artifacts of these practices, you would have an improved version of you that could continue to grow. New doors would be opened. New possibilities could be explored. Everything compounds, and consistent creativity is no different.

I get that you have to buy stuff to live. I'm not lamenting that. The solution here is that you learn to recognize when you are in a consumption state and when you are in a creative state.

Start logging your activities and label them as either Consumption or Creation. You'll probably be surprised how often you're in the reactive state of consumption.

You can take charge by trading the reactionary consumption states for proactive creativity.

If you do this, I promise you, you'll look back with complete and utter delight at the vast potential of your creative abilities. There will be a trail of actual, physical objects that YOU brought into existence. You will crystallize powerful and insightful thoughts into your psyche that will benefit you and others for years to come. Let those be your trophies - testaments to your proactive state of breathing life where there was none before.

Then, just keep doing that.

Finally, once you start to master this state of creativity, you'll see that you can leverage a consumption mindset in a purposeful manner. You can learn how to tame the fire. You learn how to consume powerful ideas, powerful systems, and powerful products that INCREASE your ability to create. In other words, your consumption is purposefully aimed at bolstering your creativity.

Get started, friend. You possess a beautiful, powerful, meaningful gift in the form of a human mind. Use it to create, and marvel at how quickly your life transforms around you.

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This would make a great topic for your next journaling session. Here's Volume 3 of my 20-Minute Journaling Session playlists to help you carve out that block of time.