How materialistic are you, compared with the people you live, work and otherwise interact with?
Whilst I am glad that we are no longer tied into a mortgage, rates, house insurance, gas and electricity and phone bills which represented more than half of our combined salary, I can't deny that without owning a house we would never have afforded this trip for one year. So for that I am glad. However, when we sold our house last May many people thought we were crazy, despite the fact that ultimately we are going to live and work in Oz at the end of this trip. "Oh, never sell your house" they cried "youll never get back on the property ladder again". But the last laugh is on us cos we sold our house just before prices in the UK crashed and would have lost 20k if we'd waited 3 more months. So it really pisses these same people off when I tell them we could come back and buy back our house for less and have had a years travelling into the bargain. Lynn
Reply to this ......we could come back and buy back our house for less and have had a years travelling into the bargain.
Congratulations on that lucky score! That has to be every travellers dream situation. 😊
Reply to this I am interested in knowing how others define materialism.
I define it as everything outside ourselves and not just buying consumer items. It involves things like having children, changing other people, getting a better job......... Over dependence on materialism is when we depend on these things to make us happy.
Reply to this I have no idea how to define materialims, but according to the all-knowing and wise Wikipedia the definition of economic materialism (which I think is what we are talking about) is:
Materialism refers to how a person or group chooses to spend their resources, particularly money and time. Literally, a materialist is a person for whom collecting material goods is an important priority. In common use, the word more specifically refers to a person who primarily pursues wealth and luxury. Sometimes such a person displays conspicuous consumption.
Now according to this definition I guess I am not very materialistic, because my primary goals in life are not the persuit of wealth or luxury, but of happiness and contentment. I own very little, it probably would all comfortably fit in an old fashioned trunk; what I need is less than that, it would fit comfortably in a small backpack. I am attached to few things, like my photo albums and some things of sentimental value. I have no house, but I can stay with my parents whenever and for however long I want. And that is the one other thing I am quite attached to, the house of my parents and the piece of land that they own. I love the place and call it home and it is where my heart is at all times. It is not mine of course, but I suppose in a sense this is a materialistic attachement of mine, because if they would sell it, it would make me rather sad (for a while at least, than I would get over it and continue with life). Apart from those materialistic things, everything else I value are my family and friends and the freedom to live the life I have chosen. Those are the things that really make me happy.
Reply to this .....but I suppose in a sense this is a materialistic attachement of mine, because if they would sell it, it would make me rather sad (for a while at least, than I would get over it and continue with life).
Maybe what you like about your family home is how it makes you feel. The physical house could have been anywhere or be of any type. Maybe being at home reminds you of the part of yourself which is still childish. The fun loving, innocent..... And of course the secure feeling from when your parents sorted out all your problems so you didnt even need to know about them. I dont think this is materialistic. Everybody needs 18 protected years. This is part of being a balanced adult. We only have to look at the problems people who have experienced childhood abuse have to see how important this is.
But having said that, I admit that I would love to be able to buy my parents in laws house. It is so unusual and beautiful. It is one of those tall Dutch houses with a fantastic view of a canal that goes past the end of their garden. They are convinced that they need a different place to live because they will get too old to climb the stairs. There are 3 sets of stairs involved in just getting to their living room and that is not even the top floor. :D But, I can just fantasize, because I doubt that I will ever have the money it take to buy that house and certainly not before they planning to sell it.
Reply to this Hi, I can't seem to work out how to select sections of quotes other people have made and use them in my own reply. Can anyone tell me how you do it please?
I wanted to reply to comments 'thecrashpacker' and 'Ali' wrote on jobs, houses and class in the UK.
My partner Lynn posted above saying that the cash we're living on while we're travelling came from the sale of our house in England. Thats true, so its a bit difficult for me to slag off the capitalist materialist system that gave me the funds to be able to be 'workshyandshameless' but I'll have a go anyway! haha.
Don't you think owning a house is a strange thing? You can't take it with you when you're dead. If you've got kids and you want to pass on some wealth to them after you die I can understand that. But how many old people in the UK are sat in houses worth a small fortune, too scared to put on more than one bar on the electric fire because they don't have the money in their pension to pay the electricity bills?
Affordable travel is a recent development. In the past it was only the the truly upper class that could afford the extravagance. My parents generation were happy with a weekend in the rain in Blackpool once a year. Twenty years ago I was happy with a couple of weeks beach holiday somewhere in the Med. Without wanting to get too political about it I think this is the way the people at the top want it. A year round productive workforce having a week off here and there to drink themselves stupid in the sunshine, and then go back to work. Nowadays its easy to travel and as cheap or as expensive as you want it to be, almost anyone can get the money together to travel if they put their minds to it. Its almost a rite of passage for people 18 or 19 years old to have a gap year and travel, that was almost unheard of not so long ago. Where do gap year kids get their funds from? cos they've never worked. I think the money comes from their parents who have borrowed money against the raised value of their homes. I don't think the government will be happy with all this cash from the UK ecomony being spent elsewhere in the world. I'm surprised they don't raise the taxes on flights more than they do already. Maybe its just a matter of time.
Jobs. One of the things that used to annoy me back in the UK was being introduced to other people say at a party or in a pub and almost always the first question people want to know is 'what do you do?' as in 'What is your job?' Its as though people in the UK define themselves by their jobs. And they measure you against themselves by what type of job you have, the size of your house and car etc. Most people's jobs are mundane, I certainly never wanted to talk about mine. When I wasn't at work I wanted to forget about it.
I would much rather talk to people about where they've been in the world, or what their opinions are, rather than their 9 to 5 role in sales or insurance.
One of the good experiences travelling is that no one talks about work. Great! Most people we meet and talk with in bars or hostals want to swap travel information and experiences and that's fine with me.
Reply to this Nah Mel, I just love the house and the garden... Ha, ha, ha... Just kidding... It is both of course, this is where I grew up a big part of my life and there are memories here and all that. Saying that, it is also an incredibly relaxing place to call home. My parents live on the country side, close to the German border, we have a huge garden (1 hectare), a pool and a big house. This makes things easier for me, because if I am home for a while and they would have a much smaller place, I would quickly get in the way of my parents I think, but here not. Anyway I love the peace and quiet of the country side, the chirping of the birds, the hedge hogs trodding about the garden, the bunnies (which my mum hates by the way because they dig up her vegetable plot) frolicking around and all that... And I have a lot to do, which makes me feel useful, because getting free room and board without doing anything would make me feel very guilty. So I cut grass, clean pools, vacuum clean the house, clean the bathroom... A regular houseman I am 😊 All in all I love this place, it is a little piece of paradise to which I can always return, and I am grateful that my parents bought it all those long years ago when prices were still reasonable and turned it into what it is now, because they did everything. It is always handy to have a Civil Engineer as a father, he can ask the farmer neighbours to dig a hole in the ground and half a year later the hole has turned into a nice pool at a fraction of the cost of having one built!
Anyway, I would say I am quite attached to it, for which ever reason... Materialistic or sentimental, I don't know...
Reply to this Its almost a rite of passage for people 18 or 19 years old to have a gap year and travel, that was almost unheard of not so long ago. Where do gap year kids get their funds from? cos they've never worked.
Are you sure none of them have worked? Quite a bold statement. I am not English, but I can't imagine all of these kids have just borrowed money from their parents. Even if they would want to, how many parents would actually lend their kids money for a year abroad, no strings attached? I would think that at least a part of them will have worked for a while to get the money and most of them only need a small amount because they either end up in Australia or New Zealand on a working holiday visa and work there (and party it all away every weekend)...
If you want to use quotes, at the bottom right of this page there is a small section called TravelBlog Formatting Codes, it gives you codes for making headings, bold text, italic text, and quotes among other things...
Reply to this [quote]Hi, I can't seem to work out how to select sections of quotes other people have made and use them in my own reply. Can anyone tell me how you do it please? [/quote]
This is exactly what you would type to quote ''Hi, I can't seem to work out how to select sections of quotes other people have made and use them in my own reply. Can anyone tell me how you do it please?''
Reply to this cheers mel
Are you sure none of them have worked? Quite a bold statement. I am not English, but I can't imagine all of these kids have just borrowed money from their parents. Even if they would want to, how many parents would actually lend their kids money for a year abroad, no strings attached?
In England, and I'm positive in America as well, if they do well in school and get the right grades a lot of parents will give their children a cash gift. Some of these kids will use that money to have a gap year travelling. There are many young people travelling, especially young Americans here in Central America. I can't imagine with their full time studies how they managed to save all the money required for a big trip working Saturday afternoons in a shop? Saying that, of course a lot of people work straight from school from age 16 and there's no reason why they might not have their own cash to travel.
Reply to this Are you sure none of them have worked? Quite a bold statement.
Indeed! I started babysitting for a few different neighbours when I was 11. I worked in a clothes shop when I was 15. I worked in a garden center when I was 17. One can have put in quite a few working hours by the time one is 18. But, that type of child labour is probably unacceptable these days.
....the capitalist materialist system that gave me the funds to be able to be 'workshyandshameless' but I'll have a go anyway! haha.
And the capitalist system is not all bad anyway. When industries and companies have some morals there is really not anything wrong with them. But, yeah I know somebody will likely point out that not many of them have morals, and I agree with that.
Reply to this Don't you think owning a house is a strange thing? You can't take it with you when you're dead.
I just wish it was simpler or there was a simpler alternative that works. I find myself spending way too much time these days fretting about pieces of paper concerning my mortgage, insurance, tax..........
Affordable travel is a recent development. In the past it was only the the truly upper class that could afford the extravagance.
The hippies in the 60s seem to have managed affordable travel and set the great example that many of us follow these days.
I don't think the government will be happy with all this cash from the UK ecomony being spent elsewhere in the world.
Tourists go to England too, so it probably all evens out moneywise in the end.
Reply to this How materialisiic are you, guys? Could you carry everything you want/need in the back of a truck? A car? Just a backpack?
I just read something that reminded me of this quote. :D
Somebody asked somebody else what they think about minimism. The response was ''I want the best minimalism that money can buy, and I want it everywhere.''
Reply to this 
