Enrich your life... just make something!

This post began as a description of how my subconscious has been infiltrated by the large numbers of images of spoons I seem to see daily on social media and in wood magazines. I have often referred to images I see being entered in my cranial computer, where they lay dormant before springing forth at the least expected moment to evolve into a new project with my own peculiar twist.

And as I continued to write and think out loud, my mind went off on a different tangent considering the role ‘making’ may evolve into as our society changes, as people become underemployed and are left with more free time and less money to spend.

‘Work’ for many gives structure in life, it gives reason to get up from Monday to Friday, sleep in on Saturday and Sunday…It gives one a place in society, it provides a place of worth, of being needed and a feeling of contributing to society. Take away ‘work’ and many feel they are of no use to the world they live in.

Once upon a time people made the objects they could not afford, or as was the case of my parents who grew up in Europe during WW2, they just had to make do. This was the attitude they brought to Australia as refugees and taught to their offspring. I am one of those offspring who hates to throw away anything that might be needed another day.

The key to this rant is that what was once a method of survival really helped individuals to make the most of anything available around them that enhanced day to day life. Biscuit tins were converted into flour bins or sugar bins, food scraps were put into the compost or fed to the chooks, nothing went to waste.

Nowadays we’re so conscious of time that we forget what we really need to do with our time. What was once ‘family’ time in the evenings is taken up with internet banking and bill paying, which is meant to save us time… really???

Take away all of that commercially-driven existence and the evolution of robots that will make human operators redundant and what will make humans feel needed?

Maybe the human desire to ‘make’ will resurface out of necessity. And with it will come the psychological benefits of creating functional objects out of materials available in our everyday worlds? Making may fulfil several roles; a therapeutic aspect that gives us connection to our immediate environment; imparting a part of ourselves in objects we use in everyday situations, or give to others as gifts; and most importantly, making us realise that simple skills are important and valuable, as is each and everyone of us.

We are all here for a reason and we have something to offer to society, irrespective of whether we do it out of love or necessity… my parents did it out of necessity, I do it out of love. Maybe some will ‘make’ to fill a void contemporary life has created…do it out of love or necessity… my parents did it out of necessity, I do it out of love. Maybe some will ‘make’ to fill a void contemporary life has created…