People don’t want to own things. People want to do things.
The other day I overheard a conversation between students. One of them had a new cell phone. It suddenly struck me that the others weren’t interested in the phone, but in what it could DO.
Isn’t that why people buy boats, campers, hot tubs, swimming pools, fishing rods, duck blinds and whatever? People like to do things. They even often enjoy puttering around with cleaning the pool and maintaining the camper. After all, there is no farm to care for.
At first I thought about how people like movies, television, and entertainment. But then I realized that what those things do is make you believe you are doing something. The sounds, visuals, conflict, romance, and even news reports convince us for awhile that we are doing those very things. For a little while, we think we truly matter.
Of course, when the movie ends we discover that we haven’t done anything at all, we feel even more useless than before. That is the danger of modern entertainment.
There was always something to do on the farm. One could do something different every day of the week and still have things to do. But in the urban setting it is much harder to find things to do that are constructive and productive.
I am not sure how to use this insight productively. People need things to do. Do you have any ideas?
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