“Consumption maybe regarded as negative production.” – Alfred Marshall

Facing my Habit-Past

I’ve come to the realisation that my habits lead me to consume instead of create, and in our world, consumption is tied up with spending money. Hardly anything is free. Money is spent for cooking, reading, TV, undertaking activities with friends, travelling and so on. If there is a hobby out there, there is money to be spent on it.

My consumption habits are so strong, that every attempt to create is started by spending money on items much needed for said creation. My drawers are painfully full of such evidence:

• Water colors, lovely thick paper and good brushes.
• Sketchbooks and fine pens.
• A camera stand and lighting.
• An expensive camera.
• A quality microphone still sitting in its original box.
• Software subscriptions to apps I rarelly use.
• Many more items I’ve donated to clear my drawers for even more items.

Two decades of attempts to create art and failing, because the comfort of consumption is stronger than the awkwardness of creation.

This consumption habit extended to feeding myself and my family. Faced with abundant display of food, my brain would go wild with delicious dishes to be prepared this very week. The reality of a job, children and a household was put on hold and the consequence was, embarrassing amounts of produce had to be thrown out.

The way out of this is no longer making declarations and promises, but to set a system, a very modest system. The very first building block in this system, is finding out where I financially stand. The second is this blog, creating without judgement and making that a daily habit.