Lifestyle
We are the designers of life
10.09.2020
People have more choices today than ever before. We can design virtually all areas of our life, from our job and leisure time through to our consumption and mobility. But does that actually make us happy?
Maybe you just want to bring more relaxation into your life. And think about the best way to do that. Is your living room sofa calling you? Or do you think of a yoga subscription that you should use more diligently? Trips to the spa would also be nice, of course. Or you can simply download this new meditation app that your friends are always talking about.
Whether its relaxation or exercise, food or leisure time, today there is a whole array of possibilities for satisfying almost any need. What’s more, we can shape increasingly fundamental areas of life more and more freely: Career choices and career paths, sexual identity and family life, role models and social relationships have suddenly become decisive. We live in a time of freedom of choice, self-realisation and thus individualisation. This has not always been the case.
Individualisation is an achievement
For a long time, society didn’t provide any scope for alternative or individualised lifestyles, instead imposing rigid rules and traditions on people. Ask your grandparents what it was “back then” with changing careers or patchwork families; You’ll soon realise how free we can live today. The modernisation of the Western world contributed greatly to this development: shorter working hours meant that leisure activities and personal interests were given more weight. Rising levels of education helped people understand themselves and their desires and needs, and allowed for career and social advancement. And increasing prosperity gradually turned new dreams into a reality.
The proverbial agony of choice
Individualisation is a megatrend nowadays. Being independent and free is enormously important to young people, as a survey shows: Right behind the primary objective of “being healthy” (93%), “independence to be able to shape one’s own life” (Trendmonitor Versicherung Heidelberger Leben) ranks at 90%. So does our multi-option society make us completely happy?
No. After all, more options means more decisions. And these always involve a sacrifice – in other words something that you can’t do, buy or experience. When you consider that brain researchers estimate that we make 20,000 (mostly unconscious) decisions each day, it quickly becomes clear how heavy the flip-side of the coin is. Once a mere possibility, design is suddenly an obligation. Psychologists are therefore already talking about a “tyranny of choice”, which can overstrain and overwhelm people. Our freedom therefore involves its very own form of stress.
Lifestyles are both statements and market drivers
The freedom of the individual is expanding and the choice of lifestyles is widening. This makes us designers of our own identity: Who do we want to be? How do we want to live? What are we consuming and what values is this representing? After all, whether someone gets their vegetables from the wholesaler, the vegetable basket of the farm next door or an anti-food-waste project, whether they buy organic or standard, seasonal or regional produce is usually more than just a decision. It is a statement.
The market responds to these statements. They do so with all manner of different labels (such as Fairtrade or organic), and also with specifically tailored products. From self-mixed muesli through to self-designed trainers and perfumes and furniture made at home, there are hardly any products that can’t be personalised. KPMG market surveys show that half of the consumers find products like these considerably more interesting than mass-produced goods, and they are willing to pay more for them. Individualisation has therefore become one of the largest drivers of the economy.
More sharing services
This trend is not bypassing mobility either: “It is becoming more multimodal and diverse”, confirms transport expert Timo Ohnmacht. A wide variety of transport is thus available, be it on the road, rail or in the air. This is what the Swiss are taking advantage of: Everyone covers an average of 36.8 kilometres per day, almost two kilometres more than at the turn of the millennium. We are also frequent flyers: We board a plane twice as often as our neighbouring countries. What may be advantageous for the individual is harmful to the environment. “Although consciousness is there, many people do not change their behaviour”, knows Fainting. He believes it to be all the more important for political guidelines to be put in place and for sharing providers to embrace the trend towards individualisation and convince as many people as possible to switch to sustainable mobility.