MACROTREND: Being Alive

For mature, materially well-off consumers that have satisfied their basic needs, consumption becomes as much a path to self-esteem and self-actualization as a necessity. With the growing realization that the ‘good life’ can’t be measured in purely material terms, consumers are increasingly looking to be healthy, wealthy and wise. 

- Trendwatching

Deepak Chopra Kinect

How do you make an Xbox 360 game out of Deepak Chopra’s spiritual beliefs and practices? You don’t, not exactly. You make Leela which is half a collection of motion-controlled mini-games associated with different chakras—points of spiritual energy located in a person’s body—and half a training tool to meditate better.

“Being alive used to be about health and fitness; now it’s about longevity.” - Faith Popcorn

Wellness is a commodity / status-symbol to be consumed like anything else, both created and enhanced by technology. Look no further than the phrase “healthy business” for a business perspective: nap pods for AOL employees, everything about Google’s office culture, David Lynch teaching transcendental meditation at the Bridgewater hedge fund