Things and Experiences and Happiness

I watched two YT videos recently which hit a number of spots. I'll be riffing on them over the next few weeks. This https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5p_sqQHdvcE was one, in which the speaker referred to some research that suggested that if you want to spend money to make you feel happy, then buy experiences not things.

After I finished nodding along, my inner philosopher wanted some nuance.

Because buy experiences not things is one of those rules-of-thumb that requires us to fill in all sorts of blanks.

Any experience? Like travelling on a Japanese subway in the rush hour? Dealing with the Italian bureaucracy? Getting your teeth drilled?

As for things... don't buy a painting, or a sculpture? Don't buy novels, or textbooks? As for that car because you live in the country, nah. That's a thing. Things bad.

Obviously not.

Listening to music is an experience, and the live music industry would like it if you would immediately equate 'experience' with 'live'. A concert is an experience for sure. The musicians play in a different way than they do in the studio, and there's the whole-event items: travel there, the concert hall itself, the seats (okay, we'll pass that over, because seating is not always wonderful), the audience, the intervals, leaving at the end into the night, the comments you exchange with whoever you are with, the journey home (might want to pass over that one as well if it's by public transport).

Listening to music at home is an experience, speaker-fi or head-fi, though not as multi-faceted as a concert. Home listening needs gear: amplifiers, speakers, CD players, streamers, turntables, headphones... these are all tools to provide the home listening experience.

Buying tools to provide an experience, especially one that can be repeated at nearly zero marginal cost, is okay.

Tools are things we use to produce or to do something.

A watch is a tool if you wear it to tell the time.

But if it's the sixth one in your collection and you bought it because of the brand and image - then it's a 'bad thing'

A car is a tool to travel in.

But if all you do is drive round the suburbs, and you bought a Mercedes 500, you bought a 'bad thing'.

If you bought your Naim Uniti Atom because it's a well-reviewed super-integrated amp and you wanted a compact piece of kit rather than a bunch of separates, then it's a tool. If you bought it because it looks cool and trendy and makes you feel like an audiophile, then it's a 'bad thing'.

A piece of jewellery on certain women is a tool: it helps show them off, and that's part of their job. A fancy Rolex on your wrist just marks you out to the local muggers.

This doesn't mean that anything but the cheapest is a show-off, over-compensating piece of glitter.

Up to a certain point, there's a good relationship between price and quality. Quality tools are always acceptable.

When they have rubies embedded in them? That's way over the line.

If a thing gives you an experience - such as a signed first edition - then it's a 'good thing'. But if it doesn't, and you just bought it because that's what you think you're supposed to do, then it's a 'bad thing'.