Extremely cringe thing I nearly fell for

My brother nearly fell for a scam that made me view my own wants and spending in a new light. <br><br>I guess you could call him a bit of a tech/phone enthusiast (he buys new gadgets, etc). He sometimes buys stuff he doesn't actually need, and I've tried to talk some sense into him before. This time he was about to buy a new phone each time a new model was coming out because he heard it was going to be "the one that will last" or something. This got me thinking about how humans are so fascinated with new shit. Partly because we're frugal, partly because we're curious, but mostly because we should be excited about the prospect of a change in our lives. It's a very basic human thing to be excited about new stuff and new possibilities.<br><br>In my case, I have zero talent for music, but I've always wanted to be a bassist. It's something I've considered every day for years. I knew I wouldn't be good enough to do it professionally, but I always thought it could be a nice hobby. I wanted to go through the process of buying a bass, learning how to play, and eventually form a band. I even thought about all the basses I wanted to buy, and all the riffs I wanted to play. I've considered going out to buy a bass for over a year now.<br><br>Well, a little before new years a friend of a friend was selling a bass (his new years resolution was to sell everything he didn't use, haha). It was one of the basses I wanted, and it was about $800. I was overjoyed at the opportunity, but never actually went to go look at it. I went home and thought about my friend who I would have totally 100% never in my life called just to hang out (we were never close, and I always found him annoying). I was going to text him asking if we could hang out, and I was going to pretend like we were friends, and I just wanted to play music with my "good friend". He had probably never in his life thought of me as a friend either, but I was going to pretend like I was his best buddy and we were going to write music and play shows. All of this so I could own a bass, and maybe even have a band. I was in talks with him for a couple days (I never actually bought the bass, he sold it to someone else) and I realized that I'm not doing this for the music, or to play music with my friend. I'm doing it because I want to own a bass. I'm so caught up in the romance of owning a bass that I'm willing to go through years of process, and even pretend to be someone's friend, just to own a bass. I want to spend $800 on a bass, and potentially thousands more on a band. I'm not even a bassist, and I've never in my life played a musical instrument. I just want to own a bass to feel good. <br><br>I think this is the case for so many of my purchases. I've lost count of how many times I've spent a lot of money on something I don't actually want, because I imagined owning it and being happy. It's also what I think about when I hear people make comments like "it only costed me one hour of work, so it's not a bad purchase because it's just an hour of my time". As if owning something worth a whole hour of work is somehow okay because it's just an hour. How much of our lives are we willing to trade for things we will never use or don't actually want? Do you think our hourly wage at a day job has anything to do with our actual hourly worth?<br><br>This was a big eye opener for me, and I'm more aware of these thoughts now. I still catch myself dreaming about owning a bass, but now I know it's just a dream or a fantasy, and not something I actually want. I also know now that if I were to buy a bass, I would have done that to fulfill a fantasy, and not because I'm a bassist who wants to own a bass. <br><br>This is my first time posting here, so I'm sorry if this was a bit ramble-y.