Does anyone have advice on getting rid of material desire?
Unlike many I admire I seem to have a much larger desire to buy stuff I donāt need. For example I currently feel an overpowering urge to spend $100 on a go board, despite the fact that I little need for one.
Iām not arguing that I have some duty to live frugally due to EA, I just would prefer to be a version of myself that doesnāt feel the need to spend money on as much stupid stuff.
If spending a bit of money is ok, you can implement the policy of throwing away things you donāt need. Then after a few cycles of buy thing ā receive thing ā throw away thing youāll be deconditioned from buying useless things.
Most purchases I on reflection would prefer not to make are purchases where what I would receive would be worth much more than nothing but still less than the asking price, so I would never actually be compelled to throw out the superfluous stuff I buy.
Many times the purchase would even be worth more than the asking price, but I would like for my preferences to change such that it no longer would be the case.
If a bhikkhu monk can be content owning next to nothing, surely I can be happy owning less than I currently do. The question is how I change my preferences to become more like that of the monk.
The underlying desire of most addictive tendencies in our production/āconsumption culture is the desire to feel more connected with a tribe (Maslowās love and belonging). We areāat our coreāsocial creatures. Our ancestors reinforced connections with tribe mates every day, and they clearly knew the values they shared with the tribe. They were living life within the parameters in which we evolved to thrive.
In our society the tribes have been disbanded in favor of a more interconnected world, and likewise values have become diffuse and harder for individuals to know what they truly believe in. Just like throwing 20k chickens into a barn causes them to go crazy and peck one another to death because their brains canāt handle a pecking order that big, so too is it with humans who are not able to instinctively operate in such a vastly more complex and relationally fluid world where the environment has changed so radically from tribal days.
Invest in a few (3-5) deeply intimate relationships where you know you are equals and can be there unconditionally and without judgment for each other. As Robin Dunbar says in his excellent book āFriendsā:
It was the social measures that most influenced your chances of survivingā¦ The best predictors were those that contrasted high versus low frequencies of social support and those that measured how well integrated you were into your social network and your local community. Scoring high on these increased your chances of surviving by as much as 50 per centā¦ it is not too much of an exaggeration to say that you can eat as much as you like, drink as much alcohol as you want, slob about as much as you fancy, fail to do your exercises and live in as polluted an atmosphere as you can find, and you will barely notice the differenceā¦ You will certainly do yourself a favor by eating better, taking more exercise and popping the pills they give you, but youāll do considerably better just by having some friends.
Also see Robert Waldingerās TED talk on the Grant study.
Does anyone have advice on getting rid of material desire?
Unlike many I admire I seem to have a much larger desire to buy stuff I donāt need. For example I currently feel an overpowering urge to spend $100 on a go board, despite the fact that I little need for one.
Iām not arguing that I have some duty to live frugally due to EA, I just would prefer to be a version of myself that doesnāt feel the need to spend money on as much stupid stuff.
If spending a bit of money is ok, you can implement the policy of throwing away things you donāt need. Then after a few cycles of buy thing ā receive thing ā throw away thing youāll be deconditioned from buying useless things.
Most purchases I on reflection would prefer not to make are purchases where what I would receive would be worth much more than nothing but still less than the asking price, so I would never actually be compelled to throw out the superfluous stuff I buy.
Many times the purchase would even be worth more than the asking price, but I would like for my preferences to change such that it no longer would be the case.
If a bhikkhu monk can be content owning next to nothing, surely I can be happy owning less than I currently do. The question is how I change my preferences to become more like that of the monk.
The underlying desire of most addictive tendencies in our production/āconsumption culture is the desire to feel more connected with a tribe (Maslowās love and belonging). We areāat our coreāsocial creatures. Our ancestors reinforced connections with tribe mates every day, and they clearly knew the values they shared with the tribe. They were living life within the parameters in which we evolved to thrive.
In our society the tribes have been disbanded in favor of a more interconnected world, and likewise values have become diffuse and harder for individuals to know what they truly believe in. Just like throwing 20k chickens into a barn causes them to go crazy and peck one another to death because their brains canāt handle a pecking order that big, so too is it with humans who are not able to instinctively operate in such a vastly more complex and relationally fluid world where the environment has changed so radically from tribal days.
Invest in a few (3-5) deeply intimate relationships where you know you are equals and can be there unconditionally and without judgment for each other. As Robin Dunbar says in his excellent book āFriendsā:
It was the social measures that most influenced your chances of survivingā¦ The best predictors were those that contrasted high versus low frequencies of social support and those that measured how well integrated you were into your social network and your local community. Scoring high on these increased your chances of surviving by as much as 50 per centā¦ it is not too much of an exaggeration to say that you can eat as much as you like, drink as much alcohol as you want, slob about as much as you fancy, fail to do your exercises and live in as polluted an atmosphere as you can find, and you will barely notice the differenceā¦ You will certainly do yourself a favor by eating better, taking more exercise and popping the pills they give you, but youāll do considerably better just by having some friends.
Also see Robert Waldingerās TED talk on the Grant study.