Present crazyness

I've been browsing pinterest as a morning ritual these past few days. I like it that the first things I look at on the internet are not my emails or the storm of social messages on facebook, but pictures of beautiful things.

The selection of pictures you see on this website is of course influenced by what other members pin on their boards. Thus you can see their changing interests as the seasons turn. I've seen a million pumpkin pictures, many many fall photos and more and more christmas themed pictures each day. 

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Some of them make me smile and give me that housy feeling I always get when winter approaches. It makes me want to decorate, cook nice things and invite all my friends for an evening around a fire.

But there's another side to seasons that makes my skin crawl. It's how our society has turned all these natural feelings into an opportunity to go and buy stuff.

Everything in our live is converted into a reason to consume. Christmas, of course is worst of all, because it is so centered around presents. People are made to think that they should find the perfect gift for all their friends and relatives, even if they are people they don't know that well at all, or don't like much.

As a compensation for not knowing what to get for somebody, most people just spend more money, or they go and buy completely useless and ridicculous things that they think are 'clever' or 'funny'.

In weak moments I sometimes smack my forehead with my hand and sigh: „Why are people so stupid?“

But that's not the thruth. People aren't stupid. You are not, and I am not, and you over there aren't, eather. So how come we still get sucked into the need to buy?

The weird thing is that it is so hard to lay a finger on it. It's partly the shops, the corporations, the TV, the ads... but only partly. Mostly, it's society. And who is society, if not you and me, and you over there?

We are doing this to ourselves, without even realising it. And even if we realise what is happening, we can't just stop. The wheels are too big to stop in an instant.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not at all against presents. I'm against blind and sensless shopping crazes.

I'm again trying to untangle my way through the holiday hype this year and find a gift-giving practise that satisfies my soul, social consciousness, and my ethic standards.

Do you have any hints and tips? What do you do to not go crazy with the presents?

I'll be back with a practical strategy for present-making before long!

Thanks for reading!