A visitor from another planet, observing our civilisation, and the way we behave, could not help but conclude that our principal aim is to possess as many items as possible.

They would notice that this tendency, evident in very young children, does not diminish with age. They would be aware that those who have, want more, and that those who have not, lust for what they consider they are being denied.

Why?

Why are we so furiously acquisitive?

The reasons are many.

History

Early in the history of the race, when survival needs predominated, acquisition was fostered by fear of want.

In time, hunter-gatherer societies were superseded by horticultural, and then agrarian societies, whose farming technology led to the accumulation of surpluses. These surpluses were used to enhance the lives of those at the top of the social pyramid, who built bigger barns, and hounded the population for larger yields. [47]

Industrialization, by fostering a new middle-class, which demanded universal education, and democratic government, led to a rise in living standards, and an expectation that all should share in the benefits of progress. As a consequence, the spirit of acquisition, hitherto confined to the ruling elite, filtered through, from the upper, to the middle and then to the working classes. All demanded a share of the cake.

It was thus that a spirit of conspicuous consumption developed, a spirit that has been further stimulated by the advertising industry, and the media. It is little wonder that Coomaraswami quipped, "From the Stone Age to the twentieth century, what a descent!"¹¹

While it is not difficult to trace the intensification of the spirit of acquisitiveness through history, we still have to ask why it is that we are so thoroughly captive to this spirit, particularly when it does not deliver on its promises?

Other Reasons

There is no one answer to this question.

Conditioning

It is obvious that conditioning plays a part.

We are conditioned to believe that possessions bring happiness. The fact that this is patently false does not appear to figure in our reckoning. I suspect that we cannot let ourselves believe the falsity of the claim because there is little else that promises happiness. The anticipation of future happiness, fostered by this myth, is preferable to the absence of hope. It is for this reason that those who have more than enough continue acquiring. [48]

The wealthy are caught in a bind. They are best situated to appreciate that possessions do not bring happiness. However, they cannot afford to entertain this insight. It would call into question the philosophy on which they have built their lives. They redouble their efforts, convincing themselves that further acquisitions will tip the balance.

Psychological Needs

Maslow argued that, once our survival needs have been met, psychological needs surface.

One of the most important of these is the need for affirmation.

Few are adequately affirmed in their childhood. To compensate, they try to get others to admire them. One of the ways in which they seek to foster this admiration, or its pernicious twin, envy, is to surround themselves with possessions. Even if these possessions do not elevate them in the estimation of others, they at least convince those possessing them that they are superior! The fact that wealth is accompanied by power further supports the illusion that possessions bring happiness.

Attachment

Materialism is not the only manifestation of our acquisitiveness.

Ancient spiritual traditions warned against "attachment". These traditions suggested that acquisitiveness is not only concerned with wealth, and material possessions, but includes theories, sentiments, practices, rituals, ideas, ideologies, relationship, and self-images. [49]

We can even become attached to the conviction that we should be developing ourselves. If we become obsessive about our development, our obsessiveness will frustrate the very thing it seeks to facilitate. Similarly, while it can be argued that experiences can transform us, the cultivation of an appetite for experience can be dysfunctional, and just as debilitating as the quest for material possessions.

There is no end to the forms our acquisitiveness, our concupiscence, our lust for things, can take.

Fundamentalism

The gospel of prosperity, which promises but does not deliver happiness, has fostered a type of fundamentalism. It boasts a fantastic mythology, a hierarchical priesthood, passionate evangelists, and uncritical devotees. The meme that drives it is impervious to the truth, and resists all efforts at uncovering its contradictions and delusions.

The Promise

The fact that the fundamentalist gospel of prosperity does not fulfil its promise is obvious from a cursory consideration for three of our basic physical needs--for food, shelter and clothing.

If I have sufficient to eat, if what I eat is nutritious, and if it is presented appetizingly, I am not going to gain any additional benefit from paying exorbitant prices for food at expensive restaurants.

The benefits of eating out are largely social. However, much socializing is artificial. Each of us pretends that the charade is the reality. Eating with friends, where we enjoy the stimulation of their company, is one of life's pleasures, but [50] pretence does not add to our physical health, and feeds the superficiality that creeps into many of our relationships.

If my home is sufficient for my family's needs, and if I have a comfortable bed on which to sleep, I am content. A more sumptuous home is not going to increase my sense of well-being. Nor will a monstrous bed give me a better asleep. In fact, if I have taken on a larger mortgage, to provide these luxuries, my sleep is likely to be disturbed by anxiety!

If I have enough to wear, to cover me, keep me warm and enable me to take my place in society, I will not benefit from purchasing additional clothing that I do not need.

If I am comfortable with myself, it is not because of what I possess, and therefore the impression I make on others. Happiness comes from being at peace with myself, and from a diminishing concern over what others might think of me. If I am not at home with myself, no amount of external paraphernalia will make one ounce of difference. Money spent on externals is often money poorly spent.

Consequences

The lust for things, the insatiable desire to possess, drags after it a series of negative consequences.

Our possessiveness is rapacious. We grasp without a great deal of concern for the consequences of our grasping. In order to provide for our bloated material needs, we hungrily devour limited natural resources. The ecological damage we have done to the planet is partially a consequence of our materialistic values.

It also robs us of the enjoyment of the present, mortgaging the present to a future that never arrives.

Our lusting after things also results in a paradoxical juxtaposition of values.

We rarely possess what we set out to possess. We only truly possess that which we refuse to possess. That which we relinquish gifts itself to us, spontaneously and generously. When we are not possessed by our acquisitiveness, we have the time to drink in the mountains, the seas, a baby's smile, and a friend's embrace.

Epitomizing this insight is a story concerning the Zen monk Ryokan. One day a thief entered his hut, but could find nothing worth taking. As the intruder was leaving, the monk took off his gown and gave it to him, explaining that he couldn't let him go away empty-handed. But Ryokan was not entirely satisfied. "If only I could give him the moon, as well,"¹² he whispered to himself, as the man disappeared from view.

We may own vast tracts of land, but never deeply engage its elements, in a spiritual sense. Through a legal fiction, we own land that we can never possess. We are also likely to be dominated by the concern that it could be taken from us.

We do not possess what is forcibly acquired. This is most clearly evident in the area of relationships. Friendship cannot be coerced. Love cannot be forced. If you attempt to possess your partner, you will alienate them. Possession turns into possessiveness and possessiveness fosters jealousy and suspicion. If friendship is not offered as a gift, it is not friendship. The more we try to possess another, the more we will alienate them. They will pull away from us to preserve their integrity and individuality. [51]

The paradoxical juxtaposition of values that is a consequence of our acquisitiveness is also evident in the fact that what we seek to possess ends up possessing us. If we crave wealth, we will be possessed by our possessions.

At a deeper level, it can be seen that we are possessed by our desire to possess, and by that which fuels that desire, our insecurity and lack of self-esteem. If what we seek is fame, we will be possessed by the desperate need that drives our pathetic craving for recognition.

Is There Any Escape?

Can we escape this monster, this craving?

Some suggest a way out of this human dilemma by advocating a form of aversive therapy.

Certain Buddhist meditative techniques adopt this approach. Those meditating are urged to concentrate on human faeces, urine and bile.

I should hasten to add that such meditative practices do not represent the central core of Buddhist teaching, which argues, as Confucius and Aristotle did, that one should aim at establishing a mean between extremes.

Nevertheless, Buddhist meditative practices are intended to counter the possessiveness, craving, and materialism that possesses us and rob us of the possibility of enjoying life's true satisfactions, those that are the gift of everyday experience.

Another approach to countering our tendency to glut ourselves with things is based on recognition of the fact that we only truly enjoy the things we do not possess. In other [52] words, we enjoy what we give away. We are urged to share our power, our time, our knowledge, our intellectual property, our skills, and our substance. We need to set feeding boxes in the gardens of our lives, so that those who fly by can pause and enjoy our gifts.

Spectrum of Consciousness

The degree to which it will be possible for us to heed this sort of advice will depend, in part, on that aspect of ourselves with which we identify.

If we identify with the ego, we are likely to be oblivious of our acquisitiveness. Furthermore, we will imagine that happiness derives from things, peoples, and situations external to us. Not being comfortable with ourselves, because we know so little about us, we will seek to slake our thirst for wholeness by attempting to possess that which our unrequited needs crave.

If we identify with the self, which results from the integration of the ego and shadow, we will be more accepting of ourselves, and our circumstances. The thirst for things, and our attachment to them, will be less intense.

If we are at home in our bodies, and are earthed in the bodyself, we will be sensitive to its intuitions. At home in the body, we will have learned to take pleasure in the simple things of life. We will treat them as gifts, not to be possessed, but to be enjoyed. Identifying with the bodyself, we will be much more in-touch with others, and the world of nature. We will be open to receive the spontaneous gifts that make life pleasurable, and that take the edge off our pain. [53]

The deeper our intuitive awareness of our connectedness with all reality, the more we will be refreshed by this interconnectedness. Living in the present, we will not be hostage to the future. We will be aware that it is our capacity to live intensely in the present that enables us to enjoy what the human spirit most craves--a connectedness with the Divine.

Living with a sense of oneness with the universe, and with the Spirit that is its soul, we will discover that what we regarded as the humdrum events of our everyday lives, which were laden with a sense of drudgery, have changed character. We will find them exuding the perfume of eternity, the radiance of the Spirit.

It is only when we free ourselves from possessiveness, by appropriating the deeper dimension of the self, that we can truly care for others without our caring being entangled in our pathologies.

A Temptation

There is always the chance, when we are countering an evil, that we will be caught in a subtler variant of that evil.

One temptation we need to avoid, in our quest to free ourselves from possessiveness, is the temptation to be possessed by the desire to be free from possessiveness. Hidden in the folds of our desire to be free from desire, there may lurk the unrecognized desire to acquire a reputation for being "non-possessive", "non-materialistic" or selfless.

In order to counter this temptation, as Krishnamurti suggested, we need to relinquish the desire to desire, not by avoiding or repressing it, but be acknowledging, and riding our desire to a state of exhaustion. We can do this most effectively when we have learned to live the present, with [54] what Krishnamurti described as "total awareness", and when we are able to stand apart from ourselves and witness what is happening within the bodyself, allowing the energy of the craving to dissipate itself, to consume itself.

The Grail

The grail we seek, though mostly unbeknown to us, is an engagement with the Divine, with God, or whatever other name you give this Spiritual Presence. Sri Yukteswar caught the essence of this insight, when he commented that we seek in material objects the "lasting joy", which an engagement with "the Lord" is alone able to provide.¹³ Augustine expressed this same insight, in even fewer words, when he prayed: "You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You."¹⁴ Pierre Teilhard de Chardin similarly commented that our frenetic materialism is the result of avoiding an engagement with this Presence.¹⁵

An Invitation

If we do not hear the voice of the Spirit, if we are not moved to awe by this Presence, it is not because we are not invited to the party. The invitation eases its way through whatever crevice it can find in our armour. It is present in the voice of the trees, in our sacred places, in our friendships, in our creativity, in our love, in our anger at injustice, in the tirades of prophets, in the wisdom of sages, and in the bridge-building rituals of shamans and priests. It is present in the very cells of our bodies, in our vital breath, and in our tears.

It is more easily heard in the ordinary, than the spectacular, in the still small voice, than the earthquake, wind and fire.¹⁶

This invitation, as interpreted by Isaiah, woos us: [55]

Come, all who are thirsty, come, fetch water; come, you who have no food, buy corn and eat; come and buy, not for money, not for a price. Why spend money and get what is not bread, why give the price of your labour and go unsatisfied? Only listen to me and you will have good food to eat and you will enjoy the fat of the land.¹⁷

Jesus of Nazareth, encouraging his disciples to approach the place of meeting, urged them to

Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow and reap and store in barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. You are worth more than the birds! Is there a man of you who by anxious thought can add a foot to his height? And why be anxious about clothes? Consider how the lilies grow in the fields; they do not work, they do not spin; and yet, I tell you, even Solomon in all his splendour was not attired like one of these. But if that is how God clothes the grass in the fields, which is there today, and tomorrow is thrown on the stove, will he not all the more cloak you? How little faith you have! No, do not ask anxiously, "What are we to eat? What are we to drink? What shall we wear?" All these are things for the heathen to run after, not for you, because your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. Set your mind on God's kingdom and his justice before everything else, and all the rest will come to you as well. So do not be anxious about tomorrow; tomorrow will look after itself. Each day has troubles enough of its own.¹⁸

[ROI 47-56]