Maria Popova walks through a wonderful new children’s book (with plenty to say to adults) called The Wanting Monster at The Marginalian.
Popova begins the post with an attempt to define the condition of wanting.
Wanting is the menacing margin of error between desire and need. It is the blade that vivisects your serenity, the hammer that shatters your wholeness — to want anything is to deem your life incomplete without it. It is a perpetual motion machine that keeps you restlessly spinning around the still point of enough.
Her definition cuts me a bit, because lately I’ve fallen victim to the Wanting Monster. I don’t have much of an explanation for why this has suddenly become more intense. It mostly revolves around my love for music. There are worse hobbies, but my desire to possess every piece of physical media created for the sounds that I love is sometimes a bit intense. Obviously, it’s not a keeping up with the Joneses, but overcoming my wants seems to be a full-time job these days.