The shelves were empty. Not a single loaf of bread was to be found. I saw a woman walk away with the last of it.
She had taken six (!!) loaves of bread. All in anticipation of the upcoming winter storm. To feed her starving family no doubt.
A winter storm that would dip below freezing. Would bring the city to a standstill.
For all of 2 days, as was forecast.
I had tried to pick up some small things during a regular grocery run the night before. Just to find not a single empty parking spot in the entire area. I drove around for a while, and then gave up. We had plenty of food at home. Everyone was apparently stocking up.
The next day, when I went to the grocery store to try my luck, it felt like a zombie apocalypse had happened. with how little food there was left over.
It turns out that the fear of 2 whole days of below freezing weather was enough to put the entire neighborhood in a state of unrivaled fear.
People started to believe that food would run out. In just 2 days.
As I drove back home with the few things I wanted (bananas and kale), I spotted a homeless man at the lights begging for food. Now here was someone who really might face hunger that evening.
I was relieved later on to find out that the city opened up half a dozen shelters for people like him during the weekend winter storm.
I am grateful to be living in allegedly the most abundant country in the world.
And yet, in the most abundant country, most people live in a state of intense scarcity. Where even a two day winter storm is enough to trigger their deepest fears of survival.
A fear strong enough that they would hoard and take away food from each other. A fear so intense that they would empty out an entire giant grocery store.
How much of that food will actually be eaten? How much would be thrown away?
I have come to realize that no amount of material abundance (or food abundance, or any other form of abundance) will be enough to remove the deep rooted scarcity in a people who refuse to look at the abundance around them.
It is our misguided belief that makes us continue to seek more material abundance. Seminars, books, teachers all promising how to make money and get rich. And yet, all of this is for naught.
No, the real scarcity is in the spirit itself.