Exchange Vs Experiential Value and your Inner Voice
how to think about what really matters in life
6 minute readOpen any self-improvement, wealth/business or biology book and you’ll see the term “value” is almost always mentioned. We get it. Humans are selfish animals and always want to get some value out of their relationships or actions. Sales is offering something valuable to someone, maintaining a relationship is giving access to another kind of value and so on. Some people, the so-called social-robots, even try to keep a mental “notebook” of value exchanged.
Some of us take it a step further. You are probably quarantined right now, due to the covid19 pandemic and a part of yourself keeps whining about how you should be more productive. Why be more productive? To increase your value of course (e.g. in the labor market place). Each second you don’t do it, there is another bastard out there who learns skills and will eventually “outvalue” you.
Maybe you don’t have enough money to maintain a desirable lifestyle and feel insecure about it. And maybe sometimes, when the night comes and you lay down to sleep, you keep dreaming about what you would do if you had more money. Oh God, how many problems that would save. Or how easier life would be - and how much happier you would be if your thesis was already done, if you already had a degree, if you were one step closer to achieving enough “value” attached to you, so as to be free and happy.
I’ll go even further, and blame today’s societies for forcing us to think about everything in terms of exchange value. That means, how much some product/experience costs to obtain. Because EVERYTHING around you has a specific amount of exchange value (your car, your computer, your house) you assume “you” also must have some exchange value, and your relationships also. Deep down, you count everything in terms of money.
Is that not natural? After all, we use time to obtain money. So time is money. So I should spend more time to obtain money, as to have more time.
Why watch a series when you could study instead?
Well, guess what, things weren’t always that way in people’s heads.
It all started somewhere around 1760, when the industrial revolution began, and societies started transforming themselves from societies with markets, to market societies. Land, Labour, Cattle, didn’t always have an “exchange value”, according to Yanis Varoufakis book Talking to My Daughter About the Economy: A Brief History of Capitalism (which I recently read and thus got inspired to write this post).
And then, suddenly, a pretty complex story of profit, debt, labour, markets and industrialization began. Point is, every entrepreneur started going crazy in order to produce more profits, squeeze workers out, be more efficient etc. We started cutting down forests, and placing an echange value on almost everything (even our time). I don’t necessarily state that this is a bad thing (after all, before that most people were slaves and their time was not even theirs, technically). More industrialization, more cities, more carbon emissions, more technology.
Hey, little man, that’s how the economy works, one would argue. And he would be absolutely right. Almost all technology we have today is a gift of this procedure.
The dangerous part is that this mentality has infiltrated our minds so much, that we unconsciously think this is the normal way to value our surroundings, even ourselves.
And the definitely-wrong part is that we confuse it (exchange value) with hapiness.
Just zoom out a bit and think about the assumptions you make, while being quarantined: I must work hard enough to get my degree/finish my phD/get some skills/not lose my job, so as to acquire enough “value” to be happy.
How confident are you that your “plan” is going to work out fine? Do you think a big TV and a better car will REALLY make you happy?
There are countless studies out there stating that after 75k$/year, people don’t get any happier. Can you guess why?
Because after some point, money can’t buy you experiential value.
And experiential value is the reason we live for..
Try to calculate how much your most valuable relationships costs. Or those nice vacations you had the first time you were an adult. How much would you trade your best friend for? Are you coming up with numbers?
Then you are thinking of this completely wrong. There should be NO confusing between experiential and exchange value.
In other words, that time when your best friend’s dad was in hospital and you visited to give him a hug, that moment you gave your first kiss, that time an acquaintance of yours was in complete despair and you helped her out, the jokes you made with your friends on your birthday, that crazy night you had (the one when you were out clubbing till the morning instead of studying for tomorrow’s test), are all emotions, who do not only have enormous experiential value for us, but are also the only things keeping us alive.
The only reason to be more productive, attain money or learn new skills (except if you really enjoy the process) is to be able to experience more freedom, to acquire experiences, enrich your inner world, explore whichever paths your intellectual curiosity leads you.
Isn’t it completely idiotic feeling down, because you have to study, and having to study in order not to feel down one day? Like there is even a linear relationship between those two, or that your “plan” isn’t extremely fragile.
So, next time you hear your inner voice whining about how you don’t have enough to be happy, and that’s why you partially feel that way, tell it to shut the fuck up.
And get out to feel something nice, something new, a glimpse of joy from something silly that happens.
After all, you just need a couple of people, a beer, a place to live and just rice to eat to be happy. Everything else is just optional. There was a time when people would just work 4-5 hours a day and after that fool around with their tribe all day long.
Always remember what you work hard for: Experiences. Not for getting money to fill an imaginative void inside you.
Our brains are silly and we forget easily. If that happens, just pick up the phone and call someone you love. Share your thoughts with them, remember a few good moments you too shared. Get in touch with your past experience, use them to empower that part of you who desires to be alive and thrive, put it in the driver’s seat (along with some logic) and there you go.
Don’t let the world shape how you define what is valuable. Don’t be fooled by society’s stupid standards, nothing is worth more than your emotions, and the emotions of those close to you. Go create some more of them, the whole world is your canvas. Just crush it’s elements into your fist and use your heart and muscles to rebuild whatever your soul desires.