Stuff

aconfusedprimate

Essentials things that you don’t need

Stuff is defined as the material of which anything is made. But we use it in a different context. We call all material things stuff. Every one has their own stuff and they love their stuff. 

This is not just a human tendency, this can be seen in all animals. Animals are possessive about only 3 things. Food, Mate and Offspring. They defend all three at all costs and do not care about anything else. Primitive humans also started the same. The cave men also only cared about these three things. Next came shelter. Unlike other animals, Humans evolved their brains and in this process, their bodies became delicate and prone to natural elements. So, they needed shelters. They built shelters and made clothing to be able to survive. These were the basic necessities. Food, Clothing and Shelter.

But over the course of mankind, each passing generation kept adding more and more stuff to their necessities list. More interestingly, overwhelming majority of this stuff came in last 200 years. That’s .005% of the time bipedals have walked the earth. This is in one way related to assigning value to stuff. A banana is less valuable than an apple. Ask a monkey which one is more valuable, it might have a personal preference, but values both the same. Assigning values came with invention of money. In barter system everything was equally important. You make/grow stuff, you exchange some of it with stuff you cannot or do not make/grow. I think money was invented because of people like me. I have good problem solving skills which got me the job of a programmer. A couple of thousand years ago, I’d be pretty useless. Would you give me a dozen apples for letting you read my post? Didn’t think so.
Its not all that bad to assign values but we keep that value assigned not just when we buy stuff but also after we bought it. This is because, once own something and you loose it or damage it, you want to be able to replace it. You want to be able to afford it again. This is why a rich person doesn’t mind crashing his sports car (as long as he doesn’t die of-course) but a middle class person would go ape-shit if there is a scratch on his.

 The present generations take this to a whole different level. So, I want to list a few things that we feel are most essential but actually do not need them.

Internet 

In this day and world its important to stay connected but you do not need to be online 24/7. You are not an worker in emergency services. There are a lot of things that can wait. There is no need to type in a LOL as soon as your acquaintance forwards you a joke. A Facebook ‘Like’ of your friends selfie with his first attempt to make breakfast can wait till you finish braking your fast. We often find our selves without time for important things in life. Imagine you do not have internet for a week, you can only access it to do your job. You are not allowed to even google non work related things Now tell me your daily schedule. How much spare time will you have everyday?

Gadgets

There are a shit load of gadgets flooding the market every day. There is no need to own them immediately. You can buy stuff when you need them. You saw that video of a couple capturing their vacation with a drone, cool. Just don’t go online looking for a deal on drones. 
                                        

Social media 

How important are social media platforms like? Facebook, twitter or Instagram. Having friends is important. Probably sharing with them is too. Lets say your Facebook or an Instagram post got 500 likes. How many of them are from people who really care about you? I bet everyone of you has no less than 100 friends on Facebook. Lets say, you broke your leg skiing and post a photo of the leg casting, how many would come to visit you? How many would care to call you to check on you? How many of them would you personally invite to your wedding? As I said, having friends is important. Having a lot of friends would be great. Pretending to have a lot of them is not.

Swag

How do you identify a person with swag? He would be the one wearing a shitty hat sideways(defeating the whole purpose of a hat) accompanied by chain large enough to secure luggage around the neck, a T-shirt with a cocky caption on it, half his ass falling out of his pants. Now do you really need Swag?


Idiot boxes

In one of the episodes of the sitcom friends, Joey makes a profound observation. 

That’s the sorry state we are in(including me). The idiot box has taken over our lives. In addition to television screen we have other screens we point our heads at. The phone screen or your tablet screen constantly grab your attention even when you have the television screen on. This means that people can sit next to each other and not interact. So, living rooms resemble hospital waiting rooms. If you start adding more screens, like a television in each bed room, we will start living like a dormitory, meeting only to have food. So, the least we can do is sit in a single room and keep the possibility of a conversation with your family members still open. 

Looking at the world from a lens

Gone are the days when you need a photography was for photographers. Cameras haven’t become cheap, the purchasing power of people has increased. So, we see DSLR cameras, GoPro’s and not to forget mobile cameras. 
-Having a DSLR is not a crime, but having to use Photoshop to completely alter a photograph you shot with a very expensive camera and then putting a water mark on it to convince people that you shot it(haven’t downloaded it) is a crime against cameras.
-GoPro is a great gadget, something that adventurous people can use to capture their passion. But I’ve seen people picking up so called adventurous habits just for the sake of it. Its like buying a car because you have place to park it. 
-Don’t even get me started on mobile cameras. It doesn’t hurt to have a camera on your mobile phone. You might even say, you don’t want to miss a wonderful moment. But the chances of you capturing a moment of a life time are less than the odds of you catching on fire or having a stroke. But I don’t see you buying a fire extinguisher and defibrillator. Then there are selfies. No better way to tell the world that you are Narsissitic than you selfies. Pouting your way around the social media only highlights your self-centeredness. 

Cosmetics

I’ve seen not just women but also men spending so much of their earnings on cosmetics. Cosmetics were made for models. Others do not need them. That’s a simple truth. Your creams and gels are promoted by makers just because they want your money. It must be just an measurably low confidence that drives people to use so many cosmetics. They are not happy with what they are. They want to look like what people expect them to be. 

Deodorant 

If the coal miners and oil drillers didn’t need it. You will never need it. This is the latest craze in India. The moment I get into elevator in office, there is an assault on my nose with an orgy of deodorants. People who spend the whole day in air conditioned environments do not need to bathe in perfumes unless they sweat like a pig. 

The meaning of life is trying to find place for your stuff – George Carlin.
George Carlin is my favourite philosopher. His profession was a stand-up comedian. But I consider him one of the greatest modern philosophers. If you know his philosophy and have read my other posts, you would have realised that He has influenced me a lot. Carlin had a gig on a topic called ‘Stuff’. Its funny and profound. Have a look at it.


I’m not a sage, I also need my stuff. I’m not immune to the urge to own stuff. It might sound hypocritical. But more than once in a while, I do make an effort to distinguish What I need and What I like.

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