you are not your stuff

[garentee]

I just had a conversation with a friend of mine and she gets really amped up because I do not know what is in her shed... to which I replied you are not your stuff.. I contend that you are the same person weather you have your stuff or not. She disagreed with that basically saying that your stuff expresses who you are... what do you all think?

[AGBourne]

I don't think they are an expression of who you are, because only you can express who you are. Your things can't do that for you but they are an extension of who you are.

So who you hang out with is an extension of who you are, not expression.

[Xanafax]

Who I am is defined my achievements. My profits. My accomplishments.

It's not necessarily stuff. But it can be.

[SimonaRich]

Stuff that you have is only an indicator what you are vibrational match to.

It is not who you are, but it describes what kind of person you are. You must have certain stuff in this physical world because this world is based on the law of attraction (the main law) and other universal laws.

So you attract things that are like you or which you think about.

[Eric Roosevelt]

Of course, this could lead to a much deeper philosophical discussion about what "stuff" is. From a solipsist perspective, "stuff" is simply a bunch of perceptions (things you can hear, see, touch etc.) within your subjective experience.

But to keep the conversation more casual, no I don't think you are your stuff. But the closest you would come to that is when you find special things that you owned a long time ago, like toys from your childhood, or other object to which you have a strong emotional connection. Those toys can become an expression of who you are, or at least who you used to be.

[aphorist]

I'd say that your ego is your stuff. You are drawn to certain things (or to not get certain things) by your ego. You express yourself to others by the type of car your drive and the label your suit advertises. Some people have gotten beyond brand names, but if you take pride in anything you own, it's still your ego talking. Under all of the superficialities though, yourself could care less about the things you surround yourself with.

If you start to care less about owning things, you become anti-capitalistic, unpatriotic, socialist, and outcasted in one movement. Consumerism needs you to think you are your things, but really, nothing could be further from the truth.

[ns123]

I find that saying "you are not your stuff" to people who have stuff is less productive than saying "I am not my stuff" to myself and trying to live my life without stuff.

There is a huge difference, the first being how you want others to see their lives and the 2nd one is how you see your life.

Instead of saying to your friend, "you are not your stuff" you could have said, "I see you are very excited by the purchase of your new $60,000 mercedes. And I'm happy that you are happy about that. You deserve to be happy." And leave it at that.

When you say, "you are not your stuff" it sounds as if you disapprove of her excitement, that you are passing judgement on her attachment to things, and thus on her. That's not so productive for a friendship. And thus, is why she felt she had to justify her happiness in her new car - which you will never be convinced.

So what did this all result in? Nothing positive. If you would like your friend to release attachment to stuff, you can release your attachment to stuff, live a joyous happy life, without the $50,000 mercedes, and show her what can be possible. And I have full faith, when she sees that, she will be ready to say, "I am not my stuff" too.