There is a science to scarcity and abundance. People react in predictable ways that we can use to make a positive difference.
If life works with “just right” then let us name three points on a line. To one side is “too much” and we’ll call this Excess. In the middle is “just right” which we’ll call Abundance. On the other side is “too little” which well call Scarcity. Let’s talk about Scarcity because we were built to survive scarcity. In fact there’s even a part of our brain watching all the time to see where we are on that line. To be alive means you have needs. Food, water, connection, shelter, warmth, and many other things that keep you alive and going. If you have too little of any one of them and you’ll find yourself in scarcity. Hungry, tired, lonely, or poor we’ve all had a taste of scarcity in our lives. Funny things happen when we are in scarcity. First of all our stress levels go up. Hormones related to survival begin to spike. These hormones work to change our focus onto the scarce thing. Often we find this stress overwhelming. Sometimes we medicate our stress with bad habits like alcohol, smoking, drugs, and celebrity gossip. Secondly, we shift our focus on to the short term. The scarcity can be all consuming if acute enough. We focus on whatever we’re short of and begin thinking of ways we can get past it. How are we going to resolve this? Is there anyway around this or to avoid it? The future becomes a luxury that we can’t afford. We need to deal with the here and now. Third, we begin to exchange long term loss for short term gain. In scarcity we don’t really see this as a choice but instead a necessity. Our brain believes that there is no future without getting past the present crisis, even if we know another day will come. We willingly choose a worse future to make a better present. Let’s see this in action. When I was in medical school there were more than a few tests but never enough time to study as much as I wanted. When a test would loom over me, I always felt like I should study more. As the day turned into night I faced a dilemma: Sleep or study? I’d love to tell you that I slept 8 hours like the medical texts told me to but that would be a lie. I crammed as much as I could in my head before going to bed for 5 hours. Of course I’d have done better if I slept the full night but I didn’t feel I had a choice. I needed to pass those tests and felt studying more was my only hope. This dilemma is what scarcity vs abundance is all about. We face scarcity in many aspects of our life. In every instance, the changes are predictable and repeat. Humans are made to survive and this is our brain’s way of dealing with scarcity. Poverty is the worst form because it never ends. The biological effect of scarcity like poverty is to make people focus on their present at the cost of their future.
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