Yvon Chouinard on Not Having Enough

Many of us in the United States live in what is thought to be abundance, with plenty all around us, but it is only an illusion, not the real thing. The economy we live in is marked by "not enough."...We don't have enough money, and we also don't have enough time. We don't have enough energy, solitude or peace. We are the world's richest country, yet our quality of life ranks 14th in the world. As Eric Hoffer, a mid-20th century philosopher, put it, "You can never get enough of what you don't really need to make you happy."

And while we work harder and harder to get more of what we don't need, we lay waste to the natural world. Dr. Peter Senge, author and MIT lecturer, says, "We are sleepwalking into disaster, going faster and faster to get to where no one wants to be."

-- Yvon Chouinard, mountaineer and owner of Patagonia, quoted in "Don't Buy This Shirt" on the ChangeThis website