Gratitude vs. Consumption

During the holidays, the dichotomy of gratitude for what you have vs. endless materialistic consumption feels like a battle. If you’re anything like us, our email inboxes are littered with sales and deals to buy more and more.

We like to take a step back and view the holidays as an opportunity for gratitude, for our health, for our food, for time together. Maybe your family has a ritual like ours where we share what we’re grateful for each year. We love being present together, laughing over a shared meal we all created, showing our love through our actions as well as our words. 

When we’re all slammed with online sales, we’re promised we can make our family so happy by buying more and more stuff!!! And it all feels a bit flat, and empty. Deep down we know that THINGS do not make us happy long term. 

So what makes us happy? Time spent laughing with friends, being present with our loved ones, and getting to share in each other’s lives.  

Reflecting on that, we’re much more intentional about gifts. We focus more on experiences than things, and we ask ourselves, what experience will this gift give them?

We love the idea that our presents can help someone become more present by immersing themselves in a moment. 

And that is why we’ve shifted our gifts towards food and drinks, towards activities, and towards more time together. Because in the end, we can’t take it with us, all we have are the memories we made with the people we love. And really, what more do we really need?