Buy Experiences, Not Things
A mind belongs in one place. During his training at Harvard, Killingsworth compiled those numbers and built a scientific case for every cliché about living in the moment. In a 2010 Science paper co-authored with psychology professor Daniel Gilbert, the two wrote that “a wandering mind is an unhappy mind.”
.. Minds tend to wander to dark, not whimsical, places. Unless that mind has something exciting to anticipate or sweet to remember.
.. Gilovich’s prior work has shown that experiences tend to make people happier because they are less likely to measure the value of their experiences by comparing them to those of others.
.. Experiential purchases are also more associated with identity, connection, and social behavior. Looking back on purchases made, experiences make people happier than do possessions.
.. “Maybe we should destroy our material possessions at their peak, so they will live on in an idealized state in our memories?”
“I don’t know if I’d go that far,” he said. “The possibility of making material purchases more experiential is sort of interesting.”
.. Reasonable people are just more likely to talk about their experiential purchases than their material purchases. It’s a nidus for social connection.
.. It involved analysis of news stories about people waiting in long lines to make a consumer transaction. Those waiting for experiences were in better moods than those waiting for material goods.