Scarcity is a condition. It drives people to make decisions. It creates if-then scenarios that drive change. But scarcity in our culture is implied. Many of us believe that whatever it is, there is never enough. Not enough time. Not enough money. Not enough food. Not enough peace. Our entire existence in this society makes us believe that we have to have more—more clothes, more things, more women, more men.

But is it real?

We assume there isn’t enough because we’ve set up structures where only the few have the majority of the resources. Therefore, the many fight for a small place among the few.

We have an unwritten agreement that only a few can make it. That everyone can’t go. But is this true?

Of course it’s true if you look through the lens of winner-take-all. If you look through the lens of competition and strife. That perspective would lead you to believe that you can’t win if someone else does.

The mentality is a virus, a disease far worse than the smallpox that settlers brought with them from their disease-ridden, resourceless homelands. That disease spread to every corner of the world because those who came from lack were already conditioned to live that way. That was their culture. From depleted Europe to the cold wastelands of Mongolia, from the dry mountains of Afghanistan to the frozen steppes of Russia. “Conquerors” brought scarcity with them to continents that had been abundant for millennia.

Their tools were built for scarcity. They had weapons created to destroy. They were built for survival. In a place where resources are hard to come by, to survive you would need to learn to fight, to take from those who had stored what you could not. Your attitude is different. Your training is different. You train to take from other humans what little is available.

You become the hyena instead of the lion.

In places of abundance, the people were more likely to share. More likely to welcome you in, teach you their cultures. Many cultures around the world believed that you couldn’t own land—that it was a gift to be shared, not hoarded.

And when these two worlds met—one with open hands, one with clenched fists—the pattern was many times the same.

The Taíno welcomed Columbus. The Aztecs initially received Cortés as a guest. Many Pacific Islanders greeted explorers with food and ceremony. The hospitality wasn’t naivety—it was a reflection of cultures where generosity and reciprocity were the operating logic. If you come from abundance, sharing is how you build relationship. You assume others operate the same way.

But if you come from scarcity, you see an open hand and read it as opportunity. The tools are different—not just weapons, but the mindset encoded in them.

A sword implies a world where you take. A feast implies a world where you give.

The tragic irony: the very abundance and openness that made those societies functional made them vulnerable to people playing a different game entirely.

Many would say, “Lamar, you know people from those abundant areas killed each other, too. That violence existed—gruesomely so.” And to that I’d say yes. But there’s a difference between a fight and a hunger that never stops. Between drawing a line and swallowing the whole map. The logic behind the violence was altogether different. One protects. The other seeks to possess.

The disease is difficult to rid ourselves of, because fear creeps in. If we don’t fight to get it all, we will fall behind our neighbor. And once they get it, they will hoard it.

That was then. But what’s our excuse now?

The problem is the assumption that we are still living in scarcity. That things are how they once were. We are shackled by the reality of the past, yet live in an extremely abundant present. There is more food, shelter, clothing, and access to energy than at any other time in human history. We are mobile, connected, and clean.

Our grocery stores throw out large sums of fruits and vegetables. Technology allows us to grow crops in 320-square-foot shipping containers without worrying about unpredictable weather. We can collect and filter water for ourselves. Renewable energy sources are being used every day to provide excess energy to an ever-increasing grid. Even old energy resources—oil and gas—have about fifty more years of proven supply. There is more livestock on this planet than we could ever eat. There are hospitals and access to medicines all across the globe.

Yet prices continue to rise, and we do nothing about it.

How can we have more than enough of everything we need, yet still have to fight for scraps?

The way I worded that last question, you’d think I believe we have very little. Our collective mentality has been trained to feel this way. We say we are living paycheck to paycheck as if it is some kind of problem. As if having a paycheck is a bad thing.

As if having enough is not enough.

Even in all of our abundance, we find ways to highlight our supposed lack. Maybe that’s why we are so separated as a people. Why we can’t seem to love each other—because we are afraid that someone may gain more than we have. Like those early colonizers, everything becomes an opportunity to take, to get, to receive. Relationships become transactional, because it’s all about what can I get from you.

Much of our lack isn’t actually lack. It is just our overstated expectations. In every fruit there are many other fruits; the issue is that it requires patience and work to see its natural multiplication. You wouldn’t plant an orange seed and expect an orange to grow the moment you put it in the ground. Then why do you expect your desire, your want, to be satisfied at all times?

See, scarcity is a function of supply and demand. Without one of those inputs, you don’t have scarcity. There could be one of a thing, but if no one wants it, it’s not scarce. And if a person demands something that does not exist, they manufacture their own scarcity.

Which leads to a greater question: What is it we are demanding? More stuff? Or something to fill a void that stuff can’t fill?

We demand peace but reach for distraction. We demand connection but reach for followers. We demand meaning but reach for money. The demand is real. But it’s aimed at the wrong supply. Sometimes a supply that isn’t there.

That’s why a non-content, never-satisfied nature creates implied scarcity. Scarcity is not real. It’s completely created by our desires. Quench our desires and the scarcity subsides, leading us into a place of abundance.

And as we remember, abundance in the right hands leads us to give more, to share more, to collaborate, to love. To recognize that God created all things with abundance in mind. Two rabbits can make hundreds. One seed can grow thousands.

A society that focuses on abundance is a peaceful, more loving society.

We can get there again. This time we’ll just be well armed. LOL