Guidance for Grocery Runs

Words: Justin Fung

Don’t shop on an empty stomach.

A hungry stomach, a lack of a clear list, and unlabeled aisles make it difficult to shop for just the right amount of food at Costco. Popchips, Oreos, and trays of salmon fill our carts as we meander through the unlabeled aisles attempting to procure a complementary set of groceries for the upcoming week. And the samples, oh, the samples! The samples call out to us and invite us to partake in undiscovered delight, but we can’t try everything—can we?

Though we may overindulge ourselves on Costco samples, here at Berkeley we respond quite differently when we go shopping on Sproul. Clubs and friends solicit offers of connection and fun. Fraternities and prospective families call out, vying for attention. Tantalizing candy and free T-shirts offer promises of sweetness and a wardrobe expansion. But no student can choose them all and we close ourselves off from these offers by arming ourselves with sunglasses, headphones, and a steady gait.

Whether Costco or Sproul, agents evaluate prospective offers and seek to fill themselves with the best basket of goods. And yet—we purchase too much food and end up throwing it away, or we bottle up our desires, hoping to contain them. Unfortunately, failing to purchase vegetables does not address our need for them, and speeding through Sproul does not address our need for community.

Though deprivation and overconsumption seem acceptable in the moment, they ultimately result in suboptimality. In response, we may make lists and go shopping with friends who give us a funny look if we take three bags of Brownie Brittle. Although these strategies work fairly well (except when our friends are starving), they are responses to symptoms, not preventative countermeasures that solve our core issue. Lists and friends do not fill or incline us to what is good; they cover the outward effects of a longing heart but don’t resolve it.

It seems strange that we should be filled before entering a market because we generally see this as why we enter them. Yes, we enter markets to seek the good, but we should not over-expect what they can deliver. To demand too much of clubs, fraternities, or a new microwavable Costco dinner is a recipe for disappointment and despair. On the other hand, being filled frees us to seek the good with clear-headed consideration, but not in a way that needs to fill us; the Christian tradition describes this as joyful contentment. Saint Augustine captures this when he says, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”

We long for something beyond creation because God has created us for himself and we have fallen from our previous communion with God. Though we are the ones who have distanced ourselves from Him, God graciously satisfies our longings and invites us to learn prudence and gain intuition so that we may be empowered to fulfill our ordained end—to live for Him.2

Fortunately, He offers this opportunity to us all. God invites you and me to taste and see that He is good, to drink of the well that permanently satisfies thirst, and to feed on Him who is our daily bread.3 God, as our Creator, knows us far better than we do and supplies us with our needs, even when it costs Him his Son. He fills the core of our being with Himself by dwelling in us through His Holy Spirit, inclining us to the highest good. We are gifted with the community we long for and seek after on Sproul and He gives us friends and family, His church, to accompany us. Along with family, He directs us by giving us a list of which goods to seek.4 We no longer need to be pulled away by our unfulfilled desires but are instead directed by God’s promises of the good, the true, and the beautiful. These gracious gifts are offered to us so that we may walk the road of life content, properly holding onto earthly good until we are at Home, face to face with our Creator. He frees us to live, shop, and enjoy life with a full heart.

Costco, here we come.

Justin is a fourth-year Data Science and Economics major who enjoys Costco hotdogs, singing, and drinking water.