There are moments when alignment with another person feels physical, deep and resonant. They can shiver through you like cool air after a thunderstorm. This was one of those moments. In our car. Me driving. My daughter talking. About the music we were listening to. Dramatic, patient, expansive and poignant. We were escaping from the city to the climbing wall. I said ‘Guess how much the sheet music for this piece costs’. She said ‘A thousand pounds’. I replied ‘No. Three pound fifty’.
She was shocked and echoed the sound of my heart. Sharing her despair about the chaotic, madness around what we all, to a greater or lesser extent, focus on every day – what is valuable. This achingly beautiful music could be yours for just a few quid. And a lot of piano practice. We baulked together. Father, daughter bonding.
Marketers call our rolling assessment of what is worthy of our attention and energy, the value calculation. They then work hard to interrupt it and stack it in their favour. Increase how we see the benefits and reduce how we see the costs of whatever it is they are hawking, until we give them what they want. Our money, our labour, our attention and so on. We give more than we receive and profit is extracted. Branding, a particular kind of marketing, is literally a considered and focussed attempt to distort our value calculation so that we pay more than something is worth. Often much more.
X-marks-the-spot – Gavin-Birchall
So, meditate on this my friends, how do you assess value as you go along in your day, in your week, in your adulthood, in your life? Subconsciously mostly. But what if you pull it into awareness and have a look? What might you find? Questions to ponder over yourself.
Here is an example to illustrate the path.
I wanted to make some meditation benches. Just for nice as my friend says. So I did. I made three. I wanted to see them in the world. Bespoke, one of a kind, handmade Wonky Zen Benches.
Below is a breakdown of what was involved over a period of months:
A long time thinking about making meditation benches. Measuring the meditation benches I already had for size and shape. Designing the bench and devising the build. Visiting the DIY shop. Purchasing a plank of wood. Cutting and sanding the wood. Drilling, screwing and gluing the pieces of wood together. Sanding again. Filling the screw holes with wood filler. Sanding again. Noticing, that despite best efforts, the bench was wonky. Attempting to stop the bench being wonky by sanding the feet. Noticing that this was not effective. Accepting that these are Wonky Zen Benches (my wife named them that). Realising that is a good thing. Painting or staining the bench. Allowing to dry. Painting or staining again. Allowing to dry. Divining what decoration each bench should have. Designing the typography or graphic on my computer. Printing the typography or graphic to the appropriate size for the bench. Applying chalk to the back of the paper with the type on. Taping the paper onto the bench. Tracing around the edges of the type or graphic to transfer the chalk to the wood. Removing the paper and painting the type with an acrylic pen. Letting it dry. Leaning into the fear of hand painting something on the bench and potentially ruining it. Procrastinating a bit. Waiting for the creative impulse. Going for it with the decorating by hand. Trusting the process.
A long list that some won’t have been able to read through. I struggled when proofing.
Here is how much materials cost:
Exclusive use for this project
Wood: £7.08
Used for multiple projects
Decorating sheet: ~£10.00 // Screws: ~£4.99 // Glue: ~£2.99 // Wood filler: ~£5.99 // Sandpaper: ~£2.99 // Stain: ~£10.00 // Gloss paint: ~£29.00 // Satin paint: ~£23.00 // Brushes: ~£5.99 // Brush cleaner: ~£2.50 // Paper: ~£4.99 // Printer: ~£150.00 // Ink: ~£19.99 // Chalk: ~£1.50 // Tape: ~£1.50 // Pencil: ~£0.50 // Acrylic pens: ~£15.00
I will have missed some. Definitely. But adding up the costs and attributing costs for only a very conservative proportion of the resources used for multiple projects the total comes to around £36.00.
A materials cost of £36.00. For three benches. £12.00 each.
But this isn’t everything. It doesn’t include travel or delivery costs for acquiring the materials or storage costs or the cost of running this website. Nor does it include intangibles such as the time it took to make the benches. I didn’t record those but suspect it was in the region of 20 hours. Around 6 to 7 hours each. How much is 20 hours of a human life worth?
Other intangibles include the skills required, learned over a lifetime, the creativity liberated, which arrives unbidden, the ideation, motivation and dedication. The list goes one, it extends beyond me to my family, friends and the environment we live in. Our entire lives and that which brought us all to where we are now.
These are the costs. Or thereabouts.
Now for the other side. What is it that is for sale? What are the benefits? To weigh against the costs. So that the value calculation can be carried out in the prospects mind. The following does not attempt to ‘sell’ in the way that contemporary marketing strives for. I have not tried to inflate or maximise the value you might perceive in one or other bench. Or maybe I have. You decide.
Nothing-Whatsoever Meditation Bench.
This is the Nothing Whatsoever Should Be Clung To As I Or Mine Meditation Bench. I made it by hand, from scratch and painted it too. Just for you. Maybe. My wife calls is a Wonky Zen Bench. Because I practice Zen meditation. And because the bench is wonky. The wonkyness was at first was a mistake but then I realised it made total sense. This particular phrase is from a book about one of the earliest Buddhist sutras and really stuck with me. So simple. So neat. I was wondering about what artwork to put along with it when I picked up the bench and my hands wrapped around it. Ah! The art revealed itself and the outlines of my hands fit really well.
What-Am-I Meditation Bench.
What-Am-I-Meditation-Bench – Gavin-Birchall
Now then, here is the What Am I If I Am Not My Body? Meditation Bench. Handmade and painted no less. A Wonky Zen Bench without mistake. Such a strong and helpful question. Discovered in the woods on the side of Fell Foot, near lake Windermere. In a big canvas tent. With 47 Shamans and a Zen teacher. A big surprise to find such teachings amidst the trees and fresh they were. Blending intention with serendipity the bench started to evolve into something that reflects the light, like Japanese lacquerware. Delicate hand painting revealed, under the brush, a piece that might even be a little beautiful. Wonders, literally, will never cease.
Twenty-Breaths Meditation Bench.
Twenty-Breaths-Meditation-Bench – Gavin-Birchall
What is beyond words? Before thought? Look upon the Twenty Breaths Meditation Bench. Handmade and decorated as Wonky Zen Benches always are. Showing the idea of twenty breaths without words was interesting. Many, small circles became the way. Breath in, breath out. One. Breath in, breath out. Two. And so on. Focus on the counting. That’s it. Simples. With the under bench invitation ‘Let’s have a cup of tea’ to remind us that the world of form is the world of emptiness and the world of emptiness is the world of form. Always room for breathing. And tea.
So there you are. Do you have both sides of the value calculation now? Costs and benefits. It may seem that way. I outlined the costs and I outlined the benefits. But I’m afraid not. I gave you the costs for creating the benches. They are my costs. Not yours. The value calculation balances your costs vs the benefits you receive. Really what I was doing was highlighting the work that has gone into making the benches and then sharing a little of the making process. All ways that people will aim to maximise the value you perceive in what they are offering. The materials, the labour, the craftsmanship, the artistry, the storytelling. I’ve done this not to deceive but to illustrate. Others will do it not to illustrate but to deceive.
People will use all of their imagination, creativity, intelligence, privilege, resources and some less appealing qualities to encourage you to give them what they want. We are an incredible species so we have invented incredible ways to influence people to do what we want them to do. Then we made an industry out of it. I don’t see the products that adverts are selling any more. I see the adverts themselves. Which is hilarious, ridiculous and disturbing all at once.
You need to know what the cost to you would be if you wanted to own a Wonky Zen Bench. So that you can do the value calculation. Have a look here. Then tell me if you think they are priced too high, too low or about right. I honestly don’t know.
While you might see what people are trying to sell you a little differently now there is a deeper truth here too. Our lives are a flowing value calculation. Everything about us is designed to help us understand what to move towards and what to move away from. What is good to do and what isn’t. Not commercially. In a lived sense. Our sensations. Our emotions. Our thoughts. And that which is beyond and within all of that. The way we sell to each other isn’t at odds with the way we experience the world. It has been deliberately developed to sit right at the heart of it.
Trouble is, it has become ever more acceptable to take more than we give, to distort truth to ensure we succeed and to do it all with a smile on our faces.
We’ve forgotten that we need each other more than we need what each other has.