One of the most unfortunate confusions that Americans have about life is that we see the physical things we possess as ends, rather than as means to greater truths that lie beyond them.
Living in Colorado, I drive on roads that are populated with a high percentage of off-road vehicles. One can barely drive a block without seeing an enormous truck or SUV rumbling along on its huge tires. A large portion of these land barges are the over-stuffed, fluffy, suburbanite cruisers such as Toyota Sequoias, Chevy Tahoes and Nissan Armadas; vehicles that will never see off-road duty, and aren’t even designed to in any case. For the most part, they are simply ego stimulus packages for Gen-X soccer moms and dads who don’t want to admit that they need a minivan. Their atrocious fuel economy aside, these brontosaural heaps are largely benign and have the benefit of being handy in the event of light snow.
There is another breed of vehicle that seems to be increasing in numbers, however. Comprised mostly of elephantine trucks, (think lifted Dodge Rams and Ford F-350s) this new species can be spotted blocks away, towering over the cars they (sometimes) share the road with. They are easily spotted by their obscenely large lift-kits and/or low profile tires and huge, over-sized rims, often painted black and aggressively styled. These trucks give the impression of an almost militant, testosterone-soaked outlook that says “I need this truck because I breathe. Sorry if you get run over, but this is what I need because I am just this hardcore.”
There is only one problem. They aren’t hardcore. They are merely hard-shelled.
I will spare you the details, but even from my limited understanding of off-roading, I know that many of these chrome-laden, jacked-up rigs lack some of the most basic equipment (and geometry) to really tackle the rigors of the unimproved mountain roads of Colorado. This leads me to question why people are spending so much money creating these monsters. To me, the answer is a matter of confusing ends with means.
This is not just a rant against silly trucks. In many spheres of life I see a steady progression away from functionality toward form and appearance. This is emblematic of a shift in how American culture handles possessions, due in large part to the blitzkrieg of visual advertising content we are exposed to.
In the case of the big trucks, many people driving these vehicles have little interest in the actual act of off-roading. It is about the perceived value in possessing a vehicle that looks capable of doing so. Perhaps it allegedly says something about their outlook on life, their capacity to cope with danger, or their potential virility and thus capacity to mate.
In one sense, this image projection is the essential purpose of possessions as preached to us by the ads that bombard us daily. When content driven, informative advertising finally gave way to ideological, worldview-forming marketing somewhere in the 1980's, (the shift from what you need to who you are) we were put at the mercy of a doctrine that says the possession of the thing itself is more important than the function of the item.
“So what?” you ask.
The “so what” is that we, as a people, are increasingly divorced from critical examination of the things we buy, as the simple act of possessing them is sufficient reason to pull out our wallets. We no longer think of possessions as a means in the traditional sense. They have become ends in and of themselves, locking up our energy, our time, our money, our worries and even our worship in cold, dead, manufactured things.
What is troubling about this shift is that it prevents us from seeing any higher goal or purpose to our work, our play or even our lives than the act of acquiring possessions. Caught up in the labor of buying things to establish an identity or provide experiential fulfillment, we miss the opportunity to connect with substantive activity in life. We miss the chance, or rather forego it volitionally, to tangibly change, impact or even enter into the lives of people around us.
This isn’t about feeling guilty every time we get into our cars or pull out our smart phones. It is about trying to look through the hype to ask “why” in everything we do and everything we buy. When we begin to ask this question, the substantial, satisfying answers will soon begin to stand out from the crowd of imposters.
To me, this question matters because I believe there is an ultimate Why. I believe His love for us and His perspective on life are more valuable than anything we can possess. I believe working for and in line with his purposes is the ultimate End. Everything else must be a means for me to reach Him, or I will fall pitifully short of the full wonder of existence.
