Experiences Vs Material things – which is worth more? When your salary hits your account, you are tempted to swipe your ATM card more times than you browse all your social media accounts in a day.
Expensive items attract us more. Heavily priced clothes, jewellery, shoes, and other fineries lure us to possess them and when we finally own these material things, a sense of gratification envelops our senses.
But this feeling of satisfaction soon dies away and we want to buy new things. Read on to know why experiences worth more than things.
What if you invest your money in something which continues to give you pleasure and enriches you from within?
It’s true, money cannot buy happiness but when you invest it in life experiences they leave an everlasting mark on your being.
In fact, the best way to be happy is by giving up the continuous urge to possess new things, to own the biggest brands and the flashiest creations of your favourite designers. The happiest people in the world have done just that.
They have got rid of shopping addiction and diverted their money towards travelling and creating memories and experiences. With every new experience gathered, their investment has paid off in the best possible way.
If we understand the importance of investing our time and money in our future more than clothes and accessories, our lives are bound to become beautiful.
What if you invest in memories and experiences?
Life is built out of memories. Have beautiful experiences to cherish after years are gone because diamonds will not have the power to gratify your soul then.
When you age, you won’t be able to find joy from the mindless pursuit of material things you have indulged in all your life. Will it matter at the end that you owned an iPhone 7 when others still had a 5? Instead, you would need the company of the golden memories with the lovely people who affected you most. There is a great boy of research explaining why experiences with more than things and will be discussed in subsequent sections.
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Tendency to devalue material things
Huffington Post has mentioned a study published in the Journal of Positive Psychology which proves how quickly people who don’t invest in experiential things, devalue an expensive product after its purchase.
A San Francisco State University research revealed that people actually know that life is all about the memories and experiences we create but get entangled in the demands and trends of the present day and buy things in which they lose interest too quickly.
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The study participants accepted that life experiences are worth more than owning the latest and the biggest items they desire to buy.
After purchasing whatever they wished to buy, participants soon felt they would have done much better had they spent the money towards accumulating an experience. They realized experiences had a more sustained effect than an article which they desired temporarily. Experiences are Worth More!
Concentrate on gathering happiness rather than the attention of others.
Millennials are driven in a big way by societal influences in making most of their purchases. Diamond watches, branded perfumes, super-expensive designer wear are all purchased to keep up with the latest fad and be at par with the rich and successful.
We tend to create a personal appeal with the help of these shiny, glittery items which is as artificial as the false standards set by the society.
We just can’t help showing off whatever we buy on social media. We indulge in self-promotion knowingly or unknowingly and love it! This is what makes our ancestors different from us.
According to Dr Thomas Gilovich, professor of psychology at Cornell University, who has been researching the connection between money and happiness, “We buy things to make us happy, and we succeed. But only for a while. New things are exciting to us at first, but then we adapt to them.”
Gilovich points out something very significant here.
“I’m not saying you should never reward a couple of hard weeks at work with a new outfit and a night out, but our larger investments should go toward experiences that create lifelong memories rather than an item that will lose its “cool” factor within a few years (if it’s lucky).”
Gilovich tells Fast Company, “Our experiences are a bigger part of ourselves than our material goods. You can really like your material stuff. You can even think that part of your identity is connected to those things, but nonetheless, they remain separate from you. In contrast, your experiences really are part of you. We are the sum total of our experiences.”
Your happiness will not increase with more and more expensive things you possess. It will increase when you explore the better things around you. Experiences are worth more than things because they change the way you think, see the world and live your life.
Business owners have to take a new approach when they target Gen-Y in their promotions because most of us are beginning to realize the invaluable benefits of travel, education and other creative pursuits.
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Researchers are of the view that companies will have to modify their campaigns as per this new change to remain afloat.
As we spend our hard-earned money on things that enable us to learn new things, gain golden memories and take on unforgettable adventures, we are not only forcing the industries to adopt a new approach, but also to bring in the positivity which is the real need of the time.
Every day we try to derive satisfaction from buying things we don’t need and in a matter of a few weeks they lose their value and we look to purchase new objects to replace the old.
Generation-Y is the driving force of the world and we have the power to ensure our money is diverted to meaningful investments that can actually ensure true happiness and contentment.
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Why then spend that $400 on a new phone when you can spend it on travelling to a new place you have never set foot in?
People who are intelligent enough to invest in long-lasting happiness always have well-defined future goals. They lead much happier lives because they are never swept off their feet by marketing gimmicks.
Now is the time to stop diverting your money toward useless things and channelize them into creating memories for a lifetime. All you need is a bit of planning and extra savings.
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