Experiences > Things
When I was growing up my mom would always say to me experiences > things. When you’re an angsty teenager that wants to have the cutest pair of jeans, coolest shoes, and trendiest handbag that means nothing. In fact, the absence of those things just makes you long for them more. Money burns a hole in your pocket, and finally when you make enough money in your adult life to afford the things your teenager self wanted, you let her have them.
Or so that was the case for me. My early twenties were a time of accumulation. Accumulating expensive handbags I probably shouldn’t have afforded, buying myself shoes and clothes and home furnishings that weren’t “in budget” so to speak. It was also a time of affording myself vacations around the world and experiences that I had imagined would be incredible (like renting a killer home on the ocean in Malibu with one of my besties, and a VW bug convertible to go with it, and spending a week in Lake Tahoe saying yes to yoga classes, drinks at the Ritz, and endless days on the slopes).
When I look back now on all the dollars that I didn’t save, and I didn’t invest in my twenties, I could easily beat myself up for such vanity, but lucky for me, I got to learn an important lesson early and firsthand that I get to carry with me into my thirties — “The Ski Trip will always be more memorable than the Ski Jacket.” The mantra that I’ve adopted in place of “Experiences > Things” that I remind myself of every time I am clutching some material thing that won’t last more than a season or two.
I couldn’t tell you where the jeans or shoes are that I am wearing in this picture of me in the Malibu dream house, but I can tell you exactly where to turn of Pacific Coast Highway to get up to the gorgeous home, I can tell you when you’re coming up on the best switchback on the mountain up to the house, and I can tell you where we found the best dirty martini in town, and just how stunning the sunset is from Nobu or the nearby beach.
I couldn’t tell you where the vest or sunnies are that I am wearing in this picture of me raising a glass of champagne mountainside in Lake Tahoe is, but I can tell you that the snow that year was piled so high that there’s a picture of me in high heels standing with my arms over my head and the snow is yet another few feet taller than me. I can also tell you exactly how terrifying one of the black diamonds was and how both of my brothers left me to figure it out at the top of that mountain.
My point in sharing this story is that you’ll probably have to make up your own mind on this, just like I did. You’ll probably have to waste some money, or shit, maybe even a lot of money before you realize the faulty logic in investing in things that can’t love you back, or things that can’t compound into a really fantastic lifetime. That’s part of the process of becoming. But maybe just maybe you’ll read this, accept it at face value, and not make the same “mistakes” I did. Maybe, just maybe, you’ll take my word for it that the Ski Trip will always be more memorable than the Ski Jacket, and you’ll say yes to mountainside terror and delight over the hottest name brand jacket of the time.
