Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Living in a Material World
As you can see my topic on this blog is about materialism. First I want to start off with the fact that most people strive to be giving and try to be selfless throughout life. At least I want to believe that. I grew up as an extremely poor child. I wore hand me downs from any person that felt sorry for me from seeing me in my worn out clothes. My friends thought of me as excentric because of my weird mismatched wardrobe. To explain what I would wear on a normal school day it would have been a pink year 2000 shirt with a chick hatching from one of the zeros, a capri pant that had little tassels all around the bottom hems, and colorful toe sock matched with plain flip flops. This is just a small example of my limited wardrobe from 6th grade. Like I said before, this wardrobe led other to see me as excentric and weird. Although, I was anything but that. I remember walking through the mall looking at all the new clothes and just wanting to someday wear normal clothes that the other kids wore. Maybe even some trends too. As life went on I grew up and got my first job. This leads me to my topic, materialism. My first paycheck I spent on one pair of jeans. A really nice pair that lasted a long time. That was the beginning of my love for clothes. Every penny I got I would squander it on some new fashion that came out. I started to become very selfish and caught up in being stylish. Then I met my husband. He was the opposite of me. Unselfish, a hard worker, and very reliable. I thought it was weird when he would leave for work 30 minutes early. The more I got to know him the more I realized I didn't like who I had become. That wasn't me at all. I guess having nothing as a kid made me go crazy as an adolescent. I finally realized what really mattered in life, love and family. I had put both on the back burner. I'm happy to say that I have completely changed from that old selfish person to somone who thinks of other and their feeling first. I'm a lot happier now, but every once and a while I still struggle with the pull of materialism. It is so prevalent in today's society and sometimes depriving yourself of those material things will show you what really makes a person happy. I'm not recommending anyone become a nun, but there is a happy medium in the mix for all of us.
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This was a really thoughtful post. I agree that people need a happy medium. I always give to others and never give to myself. When I do get somethig for me, I always have mixed feelings about it. This was awesome! It was something that you makes you realize your own true values.
ReplyDeleteI have talked about this a lot lately, but unlike the way you were raised, many people today are raised to expect to have "good" clothes, name brand shoes, etc. I think it would be nice for people to be aware of the things they have and how lucky they are to have them. We all need to find a happy medium and for you, having lived both without nice things and then discovering them on your own, you are already a step ahead of me!
ReplyDeleteI was told as a young teen that any income I had would go toward household expenses (Mom's welfare and foodstamps would be cut). I didn't understand why Mom wouldn't get a job, and I didn't want to support someone who wouldn't support herself and her children...so I didn't get a job.
ReplyDeleteMy sister flat refused to wear any second hand clothes...so the first pair of new jeans I ever got was a pair of Walmart Faded Glory brand jeans that my now-husband, then-boyfriend, bought me my freshman year of college.
I don't see the point of lots of trendy, expensive clothes...but I do kind of go nuts on really good, whole-bean coffee, and books.
My sister also goes crazy over books. I guess materialism has its different forms. I wish I didn't care as much as I do about looks. I've always seemed to be addicted to fashion, it's almost like in runs in my blood.
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