Materialism Quotes
“Instead of asking, ‘How much do I value this item?’ we should ask, ‘If I did not own this item, how much would I pay to obtain it?’ We can do the same for opportunities and commitment. Don’t ask, ‘How will I feel if I miss out on this opportunity?’ but rather, ‘If I did not have this opportunity, how much would I be willing to sacrifice in order to obtain it?’ Similarly, we can ask, ‘If I wasn’t already involved in this project, how hard would I work to get on it?'”
Greg McKeown, Essentialism (Page 149)
“What belongs to you today, belonged to someone yesterday and will be someone else’s tomorrow.”
Unknown, via Think Like A Monk (Page 185)
“In modern Western society we have reached a point at which we try to get by without acknowledging the inner life at all. We act as though there were no unconscious, no realm of the soul, as though we could live full lives by fixating ourselves completely on the external, material world. We try to deal with all the issues of life by external means—making more money, getting more power, starting a love affair, or ‘accomplishing something’ in the material world. But we discover to our surprise that the inner world is a reality that we ultimately have to face.”
Robert A. Johnson, Inner Work (Page 10)
“Do not dream of possession of what you do not have: rather reflect on the greatest blessings in what you do have, and on their account remind yourself how much they would have been missed if they were not there. But at the same time you must be careful not to let your pleasure in them habituate you to dependency, to avoid distress if they are sometimes absent.”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations (Page 62)
“‘If I am more successful, I’ll be happier, and people will love me more.’ I was trying to fill an internal emotional hole with external, material achievements. Ultimately, this kind of obsession is insatiable. The more you get, the more you want, all the time never quite scratching the itch. You end up with a mind consumed by what it doesn’t have and what it didn’t get, and in a spiraling inability to enjoy what it has.”
Will Smith, Will (Page 333)
“Things of themselves cannot touch the soul at all. They have no entry to the soul, and cannot turn or move it. The soul alone turns and moves itself, making all externals presented to it cohere with the judgements it thinks worthy of itself.”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations (Page 41)
“Not wanting something is as good as having it.”
Dru Riley, Blog
“Only he who accepts that the essence or meaning of his life is not material but spiritual can be free.”
Leo Tolstoy, A Calendar of Wisdom (Page 187)
“It is a great happiness to have what you desire; but it is an even greater happiness not to want more than you already have.”
Menedemus, via A Calendar of Wisdom (Page 156)
“Part of the problem, Mitch, is that everyone is in such a hurry. People haven’t found meaning in their lives, so they’re running all the time looking for it. They think the next car, the next house, the next job. Then they find those things are empty, too, and they keep running.”
Morrie Schwartz, via Tuesdays With Morrie (Page 136)
“If you’re trying to show off for people at the top, forget it. They will look down at you anyhow. And if you’re trying to show off for people at the bottom, forget it. They will only envy you. Status will get you nowhere. Only an open heart will allow you to float equally between everyone.”
Morrie Schwartz, via Tuesdays With Morrie (Page 127)
“You can’t substitute material things for love or for gentleness or for tenderness or for a sense of comradeship. Money is not a substitute for tenderness, and power is not a substitute for tenderness. I can tell you, as I’m sitting here dying, when you most need it, neither money nor power will give you the feeling you’re looking for, no matter how much of them you have.”
Morrie Schwartz, via Tuesdays With Morrie (Page 125)
“We’ve got a form of brainwashing going on in our country. Do you know how they brainwash people? They repeat something over and over. And that’s what we do in this country. Owning things is good. More money is good. More property is good. More commercialism is good. More is good. More is good. We repeat it—and have it repeated to us—over and over until nobody bothers to even think otherwise. The average person is so fogged up by all this, he has no perspective on what’s really important anymore.”
Morrie Schwartz, via Tuesdays With Morrie (Page 124)
“The culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn’t work, don’t buy it.”
Morrie Schwartz, via Tuesdays With Morrie (Page 42)
“To feel sufficient, to be satisfied with what we have: Chisoku in Japanese. Of course, by some measures, there’s never enough. We can always come up with a reason why more is better, or better is better, or new is better or different is better. Enough becomes a choice, not a measure of science. The essence of choice is that it belongs to each of us. And if you decide you have enough, then you do. And with that choice comes a remarkable sort of freedom. The freedom to be still, to become aware and to stop hiding from the living that’s yet to be done.”
Seth Godin, Blog