Consumerism

In the story of the great Tibetan yogi, Padmasambhava, he encounters a monstrous character who is known as Black Salvation and also as Matarangara, which means 'the one who devours his mother'. The depiction of Black Salvation is a description of everything that is repulsive and revolting and monstrous and it is a symbolic way of saying that Samsara is repulsive and monstrous. It is a way of saying that what we have to overcome on the way to spiritual awakening is something that has tremendous power and energy and fills our world, a huge monstrous presence.

For our society I think the great monster is what is known as consumerism, or the idea of progress through consumer led growth. Why is consumerism monstrous, a Matarangara, one who devours his mother, a Black Salvation? The view, put very simply, is that happiness and fulfilment are a product of economic well-being. Your security, your contentment, is dependent on the possession of a sufficient amount of money and goods. And as our irrational minds engage with this view, our natural craving assumes that greater happiness and fulfilment is achieved by a steady accumulation of money and possessions. Also an offshoot of this view, is the view that choice is a supreme good and having choice is the equivalent of freedom. The more choice we have, the more freedom we have.

Another head of this many headed monster says everything is something to be purchased and appropriated whether it's a smart phone, an overcoat, a car or meditation, yoga and Buddhism. Individualism is also part of the logic of consumerism. Individualism leads us to consider ourselves as somehow separate from and unconnected to others. Consumerism also encourages narcissism; the tendency to see everything in terms of how it affects me and the self-centredness and vanity that goes with that.

In a culture of consumerism we are consumers before we are anything else. Before we are citizens or family members or adherents of a religious doctrine. Above all of that we are consumers, that is our identity and if we refuse that identity we will find ourselves pitted against the many headed hydra of consumerism. In Greek mythology when one of the heads of the monster Hydra is cut off, two more grow in its place. That would suggest that in encountering the many headed demon of consumerism we need a more subtle and intelligent approach. Cutting off heads that regrow doubly is no solution. In the work of overcoming the demons of the mind and the demons of the marketplace, we need intelligence and awareness, alertness and love.