start monday with gratitude

Many companies market and sell to us by homing in on our sense of lack and scarcity, how we want to be as good as the next person, how we want to have the same (or better) than someone else.

Today I want you to be vigilant to all the marketing that is happening around you, in magazines, on TV, in shops, on billboards and find 5 ads that appeal to you, that would tempt you into buying whatever is being advertised.

Taking the 5 ads you discovered yesterday, I want you to dissect and understand them.

Most ads are designed to home in on something that’s missing or scarce in your life. They often use clever language and feelings that, when you dig a bit deeper, are designed to make you feel less for not having whatever they’re advertising, in your life.

How do they try to market and sell to you? What language is being used? What emotions are being used? Can you see how that ad manipulates you and tries to get you to buy? Can you see how it works?

These are 5 ads that you chose yesterday based on the premise that they would tempt or attract you to buy whatever it is that’s being advertised. So the focus on scarcity, the focus on lack, the fear that you’re missing something… that works, that sells.

Think of times in the past when you did buy something because of an ad similar to the ones you looked at the l past two days.

Can you see how the ad was worded, how it made you feel? Can you see how lack and scarcity were used to get you to buy at that time?

And when you did buy whatever was being promoted, did it really fill a real gap in your life or did try to fill a gap that wasn’t actually there or, even, did it create a gap? Did you feel fulfilled when you bought this thing from a place of lack?

Take a deep dive into your life and think of something that you feel is missing. It can be something small or it can be something large. Just go with whatever first comes to your mind.

Now think about it and work out why you feel that thing is missing in your life. Why is your life not complete without it? Why do you believe this?

Is that really your belief or someone else’s, perhaps that of your family or society?

When you really take the time to scrutinise this missing thing, can you really say your life lacks because it’s missing?

Repeat this for anything else you feel is missing from your life.  

We’ve focused a lot on lack and scarcity this week, be it something that we are being manipulated into believing is missing or something that we genuinely felt was missing before we broke it down and understood where the belief came from.

A gratitude practice is not complete without looking at the shadow and darker side, at the side of lack and understanding why we have felt lack, why we feel there is lack in our life.

Going to the shadow side is never easy but it is eye-opening.

Today we’re going to celebrate all the hard work you’ve done this week. Today I invite you to find a couple of ads, preferably ads about something you would find attractive and desirable, and I invite you to remove all the lack and scarcity being used in that ad to manipulate you into buying whatever is being marketed.

When you’ve got the product down to its bare bones, stripped clean of any clever marketing, I want you to ask yourself if you would still like to have that product in your life (there is no right or wrong answer here).

If you would no longer like it, then you know that your desire was driven purely through clever marketing of lack and scarcity.

If you would still like it, understand where that desire is coming from, what the emotion is, check that it’s not coming from a place of scarcity or lack, and then express gratitude, in the present moment, for having that product in your life as if you already do have it.

Let’s stay in the shadow side just a little longer.

Today I want you to think of something you bought that, after you bought it, you regretted it, or it didn’t make you feel as good as you thought it would, it was a bit of a let-down.

Go back to why you bought that. What was your thinking? What emotions were involved?

Can you see that you, more likely than not, bought it because you felt the was a gap to be filled in some way?

Our final day studying the shadow side and today I want you to have a bit of fun.

Take some time to do something, be it scrolling the internet, watching TV, or reading a magazine; something where you will be confronted with, at some stage, advertisements.

When you come across the add, I invite you to stop and say, “I don’t want that, my life is full” and then spend a few moments, just a few short moments, seeing where the scarcity element is in that ad.