The promise of more

In contemporary society, there is the relentless promise of more. Do this, get more. Don’t do this, get less. A constraining force that drives capitalist society. A bind which aims to create perpetual momentum in a specific direction for an end that serves the persistence of the prevailing system.

It doesn't, however, serve you.

It creates an underlying tension that implies that not just what you have isn’t enough, but, far more profound, what you are isn’t enough. The consequences of this are far-reaching and evident in the maladies of the day.

The antidote for that is sold in different forms of suppression, whether that's the medicalisation of being or the use of religion and self-help, sold as a pill, a solution. The fundamental premise is that you’re not enough, and the solution lies outside. The solution can be ingested.

This is wrong. Painfully wrong. It’s misleading and dangerous.

It points to an insufficiency that doesn’t exist. It can’t exist – illustrated in the myriad examples of people who live far simpler psychological and material lives. It also doesn’t work. If it did, the solution, by now, would have become far more reliable.

The inverse is not a solution. Perhaps it's an acceptance that you are sufficient; the solution lies in a realignment of your relationship with the idea of insufficiency, recognizing that in reality, you were already complete to start with.

What would a life, full and complete, look like if the volume of external and demanding voices could be turned down?

Simpler.