The Meaning of Consumer

Consumer, to consume:

According to dictionary.com, consumer means the following:

• ·        to destroy
• ·        to use up
• ·        to devour
• ·        to spend
• ·        squanderer
• ·        to absorb
• ·        to waste away
• ·        a person that consumes
• ·        a person that uses a service
• ·        an organism that feeds on other organisms

 In NAMI, they call us consumers.

Is that what we do?

Do we use up and squander others around us?

Do we feed on other organisms?

Do we spend and destroy?

If I were able, perhaps I could consume my mental illness.

Perhaps I would cause it to waste away,

            to dissolve, to destroy it.

But would that, in turn, change me?

Would I be consuming, in fact,

            an essential part of me?

A part of me that makes me who I am?

What, indeed, are we to consume,

            we consumers?

Can we consume light, hope, energy—

and remit it as well?

Can our consumer waste be helpful,

            be something beautiful?

Julie SE Paschold

12-10-18