It seems our movie night on stuff, waste and recycling on the 30th is well timed. A new book is coming out that talks about the psychology of our consumer culture, called Enough: Breaking Free From the World of More, by John Naish. The UK Times has an excerpt from it today:

Caveman blues
Too much stuff, too much food, too much info: John Naish on how modern life baffles our Stone Age brains into thinking we can never have enough
http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/body_and_soul/ar...

Here's a quick blurb: "So why is our culture still chasing, consuming, striving ever harder, even though we know in our sophisticated minds that it’s an unrewarding route to eco-geddon? New scientific studies are helping to reveal why. It’s our primitive brains. These marvellous machines got us down from the trees and around the world, through ice ages, famines, plagues and disasters, into our unprecedented era of abundance. But they never had to evolve an instinct that said, “enough”.

The excerpt goes on to explain the details of the psychology of our behaviour, and at the end offers some very brief ways that we can combat it, once we've become aware of it (Change your mindset to “postmore,” grow your gratitude, be enough.)

One of my favourite parts of this article, however, was one of the reader comments at the end:

"There's one fundamental dimension missing from all this -- passion. Having a passion for something you DO rather than BUY puts all this abundance into perspective. It's not anti-consumerist as such, but it tells you what to consume and what to leave alone. It tells you who you really want to be like and who you can ignore. It gives you an area where striving to be better actually makes sense. And it gives you something to be healthy FOR -- who will diet and exercise just to sit around bored for a few more years?

All that other stuff in society becomes irrelevant, not because it's bad in itself but because it exists for someone else's passions and not yours.

Doing things related to a passion has intrinsic value, but it also provides a sense of enduring satisfaction way beyond the temporary rush of buying. Who gets more utility out of an expensive guitar, the person who hangs it on the wall or the person who plays it every day? The answer should be obvious."

This is an excellent, balancing argument. I certainly don't think we need to stop buying stuff, we just need to buy stuff that really matters to us, buy well made stuff that will last a long time, and thoroughly enjoy the stuff we have. And then, when we've spent enough time with our stuff for one day, we can go outside and play with the dog. Have a meal with the family. Get some friends together and play a game of footy. Learn to play the piano. Potter around in the garden. Or get involved with SustainaBundy!

See you all at the movie night!