Getting More of What You Want Out of Life

Freeganism isn’t about living with less. It’s about living with more of what you want.

If you haven’t read any books by Daniel Quinn, I’d highly recommend reading some. In his Ishmael Trilogy, summarized in Beyond Civilization, one of his main points is about living with more of what you want vs. living with more.

Watch any advertisement, and they’ll tell you that more is better. More will make us happy. Get the newest car, a bigger house, the latest phone, and more gadgets. Newer, bigger, better. We are inundated with advertisements (social media, TV, billboards, radio, email and so on) telling us this as if we accept that we want the newest, best, coolest thing. But do we?

Things do not make us happy.

Try to think of a time five years ago when you bought something new. Right now the newest iPhone is the iPhone 11. Do you look back on the day when you got an iPhone 4 or 5 or 6 as one of the best days of your life? Obviously not. All of your best memories in life didn’t come from buying things. 

Our society glorifies working hard and having a high-status job. We glorify having the fastest car and the nicest suit. We glorify slaving away to make a lot of money to buy a lot of stuff. Unfortunately, having this stuff doesn’t mean anything.

We want is to feel loved, important, special, respected, secure, accomplished, And above all, healthy. Sure, there are things you can buy that will temporarily make you feel or look better, but this primarily comes from eating healthy and exercising. 

Where do all your best memories and feelings come from? They come from free time spent with friends and family or accomplishing an epic feat. When you tell stories, you don’t tell people about the things you bought. You tell them about something you did.

When I think about my best memories, some of the first things that come to mind include camping with friends, great conversations, epic sunsets, writing this article & launching this website, and moments with my family. I have a hard time thinking of an amazing memory centered around an object.

Objects don’t provide happiness. Free time to do activities and hang with friends and family is what brings happiness.

In fact, there’s an extremely strong inverse relationship between objects and time. The more objects we buy, the less time we have.

Here’s why: The more items we buy, the more we have to work to pay for them. Let’s say you make $150 dollars for a full day of work. Buying a new pair of headphones is going to require two full workdays of your life. Say you get the newest headphones every other year, that’s another two days. What about that watch you just have to have even though time-telling devices are everywhere? Another few days of work. That nice pair of gloves even though there are thousands upon thousands of gloves in thrift stores? Another day of work.

How about a bigger house? What about all that space inside the big house? Surely you must fill those rooms with more furniture you’ll rarely sit on. What about all that extra cleaning? All that extra money you need to pay movers? All those increased property taxes, insurance, electric, and heating bills. Pretty soon those days at work turn into years. Enjoy that house you can’t spend any time in! 

Pretty soon you are spending more time working than you are doing what you want to do.

Having more items also requires time for maintenance and cleaning. What a drag.

Everything adds up. Every item you buy comes with a price in the form of time away from what you actually want to be doing.

My Uncle sent me this fascinating article about the size of the homes we live in. It shows a heat map of where we spend the majority of our time, usually just a few places. Several rooms are complete wastes of space. It illustrates the point that we have so much more than we actually need. All of this stuff isn’t creating any value. Having more for the sake of having more.

That’s not to say that all objects are bad. It’s to say what you already have is probably more than enough. 99% of what can be accomplished with the new model can be accomplished with the old. (People love things that are “new”. What does new even mean? Where did it come from? Where does the old thing go when we throw it away? As my Uncle likes to say “Where is away?”).

Imagine a world where you stopped buying new stuff, downsized, and kept only what was truly essential. You would have more time with your loved ones, more time to cook, more time to exercise. You could take time away from work if you want to travel or volunteer, need to take care of a family member, retire early, learn a new skill or simply take a much-needed sabbatical. That hike you’ve always wanted to do? You could work a job with fewer hours or work part-time to pursue a passion.

Imagine this on a mass scale. Imagine a world in which every single person around you stopped buying new stuff, downsized and kept only what was essential. We would all have more time together to socialize, play sports, dance, cook, and connect. We’d feel more connected and create more memories. Our values would center around on quality, not quantity.

If everyone bought fewer things, the economy would undoubtedly slow down. Our economy is based on consumption after all. But it wouldn’t matter, because we would all need less money. We wouldn’t be needing to work as much.

Undoubtedly, you will be more creative. And let’s be honest, moving beyond civilization to a better paradigm will require some serious creativity.

Yes, I like not buying groceries and things, but freeganism is deeper than that. It represents excitement about a life that is more meaningful. Doing more that makes me happy and not having more for the sake of having more.

-Freddy