Enough already, we're stuffocating

If your wardrobe won’t shut yet you can’t find  a thing to wear, you’re getting too stuffed up, says James Wallman. Here’s how you can explode the overload
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James Wallman2 December 2013

There was a time when big was beautiful, more was better, and greed was good. If that time had a heyday, it was the Eighties. If it had a hero, it was Gordon Gekko. And if it had a big, important name, its name was materialism.

Although Gekko and his shouting, his braces and love of money feels out of place today, there was an era when, as he might have put it, it made a whole lotta sense.

That era was the 20th century, which made sense of the counterintuitive idea that if we wanted to have more, we had to spend more. The idea had been floated hundreds of years before by an Englishman called Bernard Mandeville. In his 1715 satire the Fable of the Bees, Mandeville wrote about a group of prosperous bees who lived a life of luxury and ease. But after grumblings that their lifestyle lacked virtue, they turned away from their fraud, greed and extravagance, to a new life of simplicity, honesty and temperance. You might think that would be a good idea. But as the fable showed, if the bees gave up their vices, especially their greedy, high-spending ways, that would be the end of their easy, luxurious life as well.

The same logic which had worked for Mandeville’s bees in the fable also made perfect sense for society in the 20th century – and especially for a city such as London. If people spent more they would create a virtuous circle where everyone benefited: more jobs, more wages, and higher standards of living for us all. This all hinged on people like you and me thinking greed was good and more was better. And it worked. It delivered unprecedented improvements in standards of living.

But then something happened. Or rather, lots of things did. And they have all added up to what I think is the defining problem of our generation, a problem I call “Stuffocation”.

Stuffocation is that feeling you get when you look in your bulging wardrobe and can’t find a thing to wear; when you have to fight through piles of stuff you don’t use to find the thing you need, and when someone gives you a present and your gut reaction isn’t “thank you”, but “what on earth makes you think I could possibly want or need that pointless piece of stuff?”

Instead of thinking of “more” in positive terms, like we used to, we now think more means “more hassle”, “more to manage” and “more to think about”. In our busy, cluttered lives, more is no longer better. That’s why, overwhelmed and suffocating from stuff, we are feeling Stuffocation.

There are millions, I think, feeling this way. More than half of all Londoners feel this way, according to the research I’ve seen. Maybe you feel it too. Have you had enough of excess? Are you tired of the push to accumulate more? Would you be happier if you had fewer things than you have now?

So why have so many of us had enough of stuff? Environmentalists will tell you it’s because we’re worried about landfill, carbon footprints and climate change.

A philosopher might say it’s the status anxiety that comes with consumerism. A psychologist might chip in that all this stuff is giving us “affluenza”. And a technologist might add that the shift away from materialism is simply because we can: why have a second car when you have a ZipCar? Why fill your home with books when you can have a Kindle? As a seasoned trend forecaster and after years considering the reasons for Stuffocation, I’ve decided that each of these (and a fair few more) reasons is partly responsible, and that each is also an observable long-term trend that isn’t going to be here one year, gone the next. That’s why I think Stuffocation will be the defining problem of the 21st century.

So what can you do about Stuffocation now, especially with Christmas — the most stuff-filled time of year — right around the corner?

In short, de-stuffocate: get rid of physical stuff. Once you’ve done that, don’t re-stuffocate. And while you’re about it, don’t clutter up other people’s lives with things that are more punishment than present. You know the stuff I mean: those gifts that just take up room, or waste someone’s time as they have to find somewhere to put it, feel guilty about not wanting it, and spend hours hauling it to the charity shop or going into town to take it back.

But the message of Stuffocation isn’t negative. It isn’t anti-Christmas. And it isn’t against the idea of spending money. If we want more, we have to spend more, remember. So instead of stuff, focus your energy, money and time on experiences. Switch from the materialist mindset — so last century — and get on board with the key cultural trend of the 21st century: experientialism.

Instead of looking for status, happiness and meaning in material things, start getting them from experiences. And when you buy something for someone, whether they’re special or not, this Christmas, make it not material, but experiential.

Stuffocation is published by Crux (e-book £6.99, paperback £8.99). Take the Stuffocation quiz at stuffocation.org/quiz.

How not to get stuffocated this Christmas

Clear out: De-stuffocate by finding everything in your house you haven’t used for more than a year. Give it to charity for an automatic feelgood seasonal glow.

Re-gift: Tell friends and family that at least one of the gifts you give each other should be something they or you don’t want any more.

Give up guilt: Agree with friends and family that if they don’t like what you bought them they can throw it out. That works for you too.

Give back guilt: Agree with friends and family that if they don’t like what you bought them, they can give it back to you. It’ll make them and you much more careful in future.

Be honest: Hard one this. Agree that it’s okay to say you don’t like something. After all, if you don’t, you have to take that stuff home, find somewhere to put it, and then find the time to take it back or to the charity shop.

Be kind: Don’t clutter up other people’s lives with things that are more punishment than present. They would rather have nothing than a novelty gift.

Give experiences: Buy tickets to a West End play, a Punchdrunk performance, or just give a card with a homemade “experiential voucher” inside. After all, we live in the world’s best city for experiences. If you’re smart, you’ll set it up so you can go too.

Explode remaining stuff: Seriously. For about £1,000 Bompas & Parr will come to your house or party and blow up all the stuff you don’t want. Extreme, but guaranteed good theatre.

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