The Quality of Quantity

​Buddhism attempts to teach that all is impermanent. That suffering arises from unique human conditions associated with grasping, clinging, wanting and yearning. 

‘Holding on’ is a particular insidious level of suffering.  An evolutionary self-conscious by-product genetically bestowed upon our species.  Be it thought, thing and/or action, our ability to become stuck with whatever gives or takes away our happiness is a reality that has, or is, destroying our minds and any real chance for peace happiness and survival for the planet and all inhabitants.

Needs and wants appear set but are in fact very fluid and interchangeable.  We have now created and designed a complete human reality based on our addiction to want which has separated us from our basic needs.  Selfishly driven to believe selfishly that it’s our individual birthright to be happy, to rightfully have what I want. 

Needing to be happy is a natural position for all sentient beings.  Response to pain and suffering will always show that the effect on global survival and well-being is unattainable and unsustainable.  Human delivered and inflicted decay and ultimate top down death will/is occurring.

Unfortunately quantitative consumption has already yielded very measurable negative and destructive effects on all aspects of life globally locally and on a community level.  Family and individual consequences are measured in societal breakdown and an increasing dependence on all manner of addictive substances in a vain attempt to quell an endless and bottomless bucket of want.  Qualitative measurements basically speak for themselves.  Our wants are rapidly outstripping our needs and we careering over the precipice in a free fall of denial and dissonance of what is rushing up and at us from every direction.  The chance of a consumption deficit expanding human population doesn’t add up. 

Fear and hope are the motivational triggers for behaviour change.  Humans are not collectively frightened enough, yet.  By the time fear envelops us in its embrace hope will not be enough to turn the tide away.  Instead we are already preparing to leave, to colonize a foreign planet.  Mars is a barren planet, resembling what awaits Earth.  It’s hoped that by engineering the atmosphere on our new home it will enable humans to survive as they once did on Earth.  The insanity is way too obvious.

As extreme events increase and their effects on billions creates more and more fear, billions of untouched others will continue to deny the warnings.  Consuming more and more in the vain hope that desensitizing and anesthetizing will somehow let them avoid what is unavoidable.  Here is the only home we have.  It’s made for us, suited to our biology.  It’s a quality place but unfortunately it cannot accommodate the quantity of consumption carried out by a species it should have eradicated a very long time ago.

We have become the ultimate hungry ghost depicted in Buddhist texts.  Shoving more and more quantity through our tiny mouths and down our constricted throats in a vanity driven frenzy to feed a never filled and bloated belly endlessly searching for some quality measured level of existence.

​We have hijacked evolution and steered us all into an insane commodity reality leading to bottom up species extinction.