Pondering Postconsumerism

I experienced several pangs of consumer craving yesterday and was quick to sate them all. We drove up to Blue Back Square in West Hartford, a very aesthetically pleasing, thoughtfully structured outdoor mall. It’s bordered by a huge Whole Foods store. I often find myself thankful that Whole Foods is quite a distance from my home, because I could spend a lot of money there! Everything smells and looks so good, and you get to feel (pun intended), Wholesome when you shop there, because, hey, it’s all organic and socially conscious and healthy.

But before Whole Foods, we were lured into the larger-than-life Cheesecake Factory and a postprandial wander through Barnes and Noble, where I just had to buy a nonfiction writers’ workbook chock full of exercises that will make me a stellar wordsmith. (I’ve got to plug the book, Now Write Nonfiction; it really is put together well).

Nothing wrong, on the surface, with any of this. Each individual purchase was pretty modest. I got a couple of small plates and some wine at Cheesecake Factory and the book I bought is in lieu of a writing class that I can’t afford right now—I really do need some structured exercises. Little damage done at Whole Foods—a couple of chocolate truffles and a coffee for the road. But what bothered me was my need to rationalize all this because our finances are dipping low and we should have delayed some of this gratification. [HEY, that’s month 2 in the Year I Said No—credit card debt (stay tuned for our first credit counseling appointment).] Actually, we didn’t charge this experience, but the point is it leaves us with less to pay the credit card bill, which is already considerable.

A couple of years ago I responded to a call for essays on the theme of life satisfaction. Since then the “Get Satisfied” movement has widened into postconsumerism, an effort to help people get past addictive consumerism. On the TV front, I found a quote at postconsumers.com that captures what I am striving for with my (mostly) TV-less month:

"Becoming a postconsumer means to me that I am going to attempt to be less wasteful in all aspects of my life. Just buying less is only the beginning, the challenge is to 'spend' my time more wisely. That will be the real savings to me and my family." -Karen Aubry

Next blog: how people with less time often spend more!!

A Confession, and Going Deeper with No

I’ve got to say it. This month has not been 100% TV free. The exception I have made is reruns of Monk on Netflix with Gavin, basically limiting myself to one 45-minute spot but sometimes dozing through the start of a second episode. In my blog for writing moms,  I revealed it may be the pleasure of watching someone more neurotic than myself, plus the strange magnetism of Captain Stottlemeyer that keeps me coming back.

Here’s the thing: Gavin and I enjoy this moment. Cuddling, commenting on the murder mystery at hand, having a snack. And, yes, we could be doing something more enlightening. But we are tired and the snuggle under the TV blanket feels good.

One of the things I have been saying no to since October is overeating, thanks to Weight Watchers online , and I’ve learned a few things along the way, things that I’ve read and knew instinctively but for which I’ve needed some reinforcement. I even wrote about one of these concepts as the theme of my piece in the Get Satisfied anthology (How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough)---extremism doesn’t work, at least not for me. I need to allow myself to be human, to crave the occasional chocolate, hold myself to a lower standard for productivity once in a while.

On the other hand, my sister and I have both noticed that making exceptions is a slippery slope. Take Thanksgiving. It should have been one day of gastronomic indulgences, but that one feast led to 3 days of extremely poor accounting in the calorie department, for sure. So I guess the rule for me is to pre-set a time limit for the whims I cannot deny—yes, I can have my 45 minutes of TV, yes I can eat with relative abandon for a day and a half. Then it’s back to my higher standard. (And I do think, by the way, that ultimately TV's got to go away completely for me).

This Year of Saying No isn’t only about habits that are less than ideal. It’s about granting myself the quality of life that I want, the relationships I want. It’s about recognizing the self sabotage of not “sticking to my guns”, of failing to make room for deeper gratification by clearing out the BS that I sometimes let encroach upon my life. Oh, yes, there’s TV, and debt, and other common American overindulgences. But there’s also the need to avoid choices based on fear and to stop acting out of guilt or obligation, more deeply rooted and perhaps more spiritually damaging practices.

If you’d like a list of my “nos” for 2011 (and these include the world of yeses that they will make room for), please drop me a comment and I’ll send them along. 

I’d love to see your list!