Ownership is dying, but we need “stuff” to tell the story of who we are
The minimalists don’t tell you the truth of the matter in their one off headlines — letting go of stuff and digging into the truth of who you are is a jolting experience.
When I recently cleaned out my storage unit of stuff I’ve collected from the last 15 years, I discovered that all the people that I’ve been: an awkward kid, emotional tween, an early teenage internet entrepreneur, a federally employed park ranger, an anxiety-prone college student, a marketing director, a world traveler, a digital nomad, a coworking wonk, and now of course, a sharing economy cruise director.
Through all of this, I’ve been many things to many people, including myself.
What I’ve realized is that stuff is proxy for human relationships, physical proof of our existence, an artifact of what once was, and important to the formation of identity.
As we move into a culture that values shared access over ownership, there is a letting go that needs to happen, which is invisible unless one really feels into the experience of disrobing their perceived identity in favor of a more fluid, flow like one.
Even though I’ve been involved in the sharing economy for a long while, I still own a car (it’s for sale!). I had a storage unit (as of a month ago). I, like many, had and have had stuff that gives me the perception of freedom, security, identity, and even belonging. Who am I without a vehicle, which originally gave me an escape to move away from things I didn’t like and the mobility to drive toward those that I do? Can I still be me if I don’t have the first couch I bought at 17 or the hand chair that was shipping back home during a magical trip to Bali? What about the art that has been in my family for years? Or the books that helped nurture my formative years?
Going through boxes of photos, one after the next, paperwork, past taxes, old love letters, dorm room notes, handwritten dialogues between my best friend and I in high school, the dried roses my first love gave me when he uttered I love you, pots and pans that warmed meals for people I care about, wall hangings that influenced me daily — at one time, cabinets of past jobs and offices, photographs of many lifetimes stirred in between texts, many of which no longer resonate — I felt the weight of letting go, a space of opening, and the crushing push-pull of “owning stuff.”
When I was at the jail cell of a storage unit, I felt lost and found… all at once. I imagine that’s how this shift from ownership to access is feeling and will continue to feel. We’re moving away from possession and into a digitally mastered age where our stuff is a utility instead of a form of identity. No longer will we need passports or licenses, but rather our devices and connectivity. No longer jobs, but gigs, projects, and passions. No longer cars, but a fleet of opportune vehicles. No longer home, but an open borderless world, ripe with networks of possibility.
In the middle, however, there’s this emptiness. We haven’t found a way to fill the gap that ownership leaves.
While I don’t believe that we really own anything anyway (I postulate that everything you have is on borrow, as we eventually die), the perception of ownership is strong and weighs deeply — materialism might be the shallow face of ownership, but the emotions we attach to being able to own, fence, bound, and decide what to do with our stuff is wrapped around deeply ingrained economic and social trappings.
As we move into a new age, we need to carefully consider what access means, who owns the rights to said access, and redefine perhaps a collective version of ownership. If we move from strict ownership to time share like services including Zipcar and Airbnb, we miss out on some of the grounding that ownership providers. No longer does your car or your house define you — you’re merely a witness and a participant, holding the utility as a utility rather than as an extension of yourself.
And while access feels great from the perspective of freedom, flexibility, and autonomy, the economic roots of ownership are stripped and there’s nothing to replace them. What happens when there is no need for ownership, but the rights to access are in fact owned? Who owns them and under what structure?
Can we collectively own the rights to our housing, food, and transportation or are we happy to set aside our rights in favor of caffeinated, app driven freedom?
What happens when you don’t live anywhere, have no car, no real job, and no boundary of definition? This reality is enlivening, but there is a large in-between that many gig economy workers feel without protection, car sharers sense without ownership, and young people innately understand by the lack of traditional jobs. We need better policies for workers of this new economy and to stop leaving them in the 1099 grey area because there isn’t any convenient place to put them.
While freedom definitely drives me in many ways, I’m also aware that we’re being sold a reality that gives us choice in the immediate, but lacks individuated identity, connection or care for “stuff,” and the economic benefits of stewardship.
In the end, I donated the majority of my stuff, I’m selling my car, and I generally feel lighter. I’m still, however, struggling the paradox that life is fleeting and only truly exists where ever you are, with who you’re with in that moment, mixed with the reality that our lives are only as secure as the objects or investments that root them.
This is all to say, ownership has value. With ownership, you can vest value over time and have rights associated, including that of identity. Access promotes short term freedom, but doesn’t offer the longevity of capital over time. Access is definitely the future and also offers the benefit of efficient sustainability as well as a platform for greater distribution of resources, but we need to be careful in our next steps. Who or what owns the access?
How do we share access and ownership in the economy we’re bridging from the industrial to a digital age?
More on how I’m using the sharing economy to lighten up in a later post.
Chelsea Rustrum is an early internet entrepreneur, founding Free Mania, a site for frugal consumers, a sharing economy author of “It’s a Shareable Life,” speaker, writer, community strategist, and creative marketer.
