Catch up with status quo
What if you could get rid of the idea that you always need to catch up with your peers status-wise? What changes will you make in your life? What stops you from doing that?
TL;DR
Most of what we think we want is not genuinely ours – it is programmed by advertising and social pressure. If you dropped the need to match your peers’ status, your choices about work, relationships, and possessions would look radically different.
Will you hold on to your job/relationships/activities? Do you want that shiny new object? Is that object a necessity or just a show-off to others?
Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off. — Fight Club
Are the things we think we want the things that we genuinely want? Or has someone programmed you into thinking that you want them?
What if you could relive yesterday? What changes would you make? What changes are you making for tomorrow?
For more reflections like this, see Thoughts.
FAQ
Q: How do you know if you are playing the status game? A: Ask yourself: would you still want that shiny new object if nobody else could see it? If the answer is no, you are chasing status, not genuine desire.
Q: Why do we feel the need to catch up with peers? A: Advertising and social conditioning have trained us to equate material possessions with success and worth. As Fight Club puts it, we work jobs we hate to buy things we do not need to impress people we do not care about.
Q: How can you break free from the status game? A: Start by questioning each desire: is this something I genuinely want, or has someone programmed me into wanting it? Distinguish between necessity and performance. The changes you would make if you stopped keeping score are probably the changes worth making.
