I always thought it was to those who wait. Not according to Holden’s latest TV ad though. Their line “good things come to those who want” took me back in a flash to the 1987 movie Wall St and Michael Douglas’ line as the character Gordon Gekko promoting with great relish “greed is good”. Twenty three years later
Whether you’re a Baby Boomer like me or part of Generation X, Y or Z or whatever, I find the incessant emphasis on me, me, me more than a little tiresome. The belief that our cravings have to be satisfied now rather than later, which is obviously the point of advertising anyway, strikes at the heart of so many people’s insurmountable financial burdens, where huge mortgages, multiple credit cards maxed out to the limit, and living beyond their means brings them to the point of unavoidable crisis.
I don’t begrudge anyone going out and buying a Holden, far from it. Holden’s intention could have simply been that if you want something good, get a Holden instead of a Ford, maybe that was their idea. Maybe the ‘waiting’ was inherent in their thinking, that if you dream of owning your particular model of General Motors merchandise long enough, it will eventually be yours. Maybe it was simply, here’s a new model, therefore you have to want it. Whatever was behind their choice of the phrase, it certainly grated on me.
What’s so bad about waiting anyway? What makes us think we need instant gratification? Do we really need to pursue the relentless accumulation of stuff as if it’s our birthright? Whatever level of income we’re on, there does come a point when enough is enough, even if we do think we need that extra gadget, gizmo, accessory, or upgrade of the current model of whatever.
As opposed to the Holden TV ad ending of "you can never have too much of a good thing," I prefer to quote a line from the movie Sabrina…
“More isn’t necessarily better, sometimes more is just more.”
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