Something I’ve observed a lot is that people will place more value on the things they own than on the experiences they can have. Every so often I’ll hear someone boast about the latest phone they got, or some other type of treasured object that they covet and now have, as if by having it they suddenly have a different status. And I’ll admit that I’m occasionally guilty of this behavior myself, but in the end objects don’t mean anything unless they can provide an experience that brings meaning to our lives.

When’s the last time you hiked somewhere new, or visited a new place that you’d always wanted to visit? The quality of a person’s life isn’t measured in the quantity of what s/he has, but in the quality of experiences. Buying an iphone doesn’t mean much, if in the end, it causes you to miss out on experiences happening around you.

When was the last time you took a walk to just soak in the sites around you, or purposely decided to walk somewhere new to learn more about your neighborhood? It’s very easy to get conditioned to just looking up everything on a computer screen, but the computer screen doesn’t even begin to really show you what you could experience directly. Seeing someone skydive is very different actually skydiving.

Realistically we have a limited amount of time to live and so we have to determine what is a valuable exchange for that time. To me, spending a weekend traveling to somewhere new and learning about that place can provide some rich experiences that I couldn’t get by buying the latest gadget or doodad.

Are you sacrificing experiences for things? It’s worth considering that question carefully. The quality of your life is more important than any object, because you only have one life to live.

Latest Radio Interview

My latest interview is with psychic and body worker Sarah Lambert. We discuss people’s relationship with their bodies and how they can improve that relationship.