Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Ownership of the Experience

Ownership is (in my opinion) an illusion, save for in one respect and this respect is in the instance of experiences. Experiences as experienced by individuals are the one thing that in all practical senses belong to those individuals. This is not in spite of the fact that there's nothing physical to own, but rather because of this fact. To claim ownership over anything physical is ridiculous because of the impermanence of this "ownership" and of the impermanence of the physical itself. However, experiences--whether chosen by the individual or not--are the only thing that no one else can access, take away or share in.
The irony of the system of society in which we live is that the majority of most peoples experiences consist of running around trying to grab more and more of the physical, all the while trying to hold on to everything they have previously picked up.
Liberation from this vicious cycle consumerist ouroboros comes with this realization that physical ownership is in fact an illusion. At this point we can stop, as Fight Club's Tyler Durden puts it, "working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need."




In other words, we need to reclaim ownership of the experience and transcend the system so that we can begin our purposeful and meaningful existence.