One of the primary effects of our culture’s obsession with time has been to make us quantity-oriented instead of quality-oriented. Therefore, it has become necessary for us to measure everything. We have become obsessed with amounts, sizes, numbers, and distances. And we only think of amount, sizes and distances in comparative terms. Now, we have arrived at a point where we think that quantitative superiority equals qualitative superiority. This has resulted in us having more but Enjoying Life less.
Enjoying Life Less
We have conditioned ourselves to quantify even our own worth as persons. The indicators are our tangible achievements, material possessions, popularity, and number of accomplishments. If we have done less than or less well than others, we feel inferior to them. The person who achieves quantitative superiority in their ventures is considered successful– a hero, someone to worship. Thus we have all bought into this culture’s definition of successfulness and results. We allow our own opinions to be ruled and influenced by the opinions of those who simply seem to have more (politicians, entertainers, and athletes).
Our leaders and would-be-leaders are not judged on their personal merits and leadership qualities anymore, but rather on their ability to “win” support measured in terms of “buying” votes. Additionally, our reservoir of useful knowledge has been transformed into data, think tanks, and popularity polls.
But there are no shortcuts to being remarkable. Mediocrity results when we place convenience over substance and quantity over quality. Yet time and time again, we pursue the route of convenience because we want to make our lives simpler in order to pack more into them, consequently possessing more but enjoying life less. We see it in the food we put into our bodies, in the brief communication we offer to each other, in the replacement of books with Tweets, and in the lack of quality art (music, TV, movies, etc.) offered to our culture. All of this has been completely detrimental to our very existence.
We’ve come to believe that more is better. Convenience isn’t always a negative, but when our lives are constantly focused on accumulating more, we end up filling our days with more stuff to do and less time to do it consequently we are always in a rush. We are ultimately giving less than our best in all areas. Quality is negated. If you want to stand out these days, sacrifice quantity for the sake of quality.
Think of the difference it would make in our lives if we knew we had ready access to everything we could ever want or need. We would not have to worry about the future at all. We would not be consumed about saving up enough, about emergency needs, about losing everything, or about any kind of shortage. Well, guess what? God will put us in that place where we need never be intimidated or fearful about experiencing any kind of lack or having more but enjoying life less.
