I just purchased my VIP tickets for a couple of parties happening in town next weekend. All In I spent about twenty bucks more than the standard cost of tickets, but I don’t have to wait in line when I get there and get to relax and buy my drinks in a “private” VIP area when the masses become overwhelming and the line for a cocktail is three deep.
I am also now at the airport waiting in the Delta Sky Club for my flight to board: with a free drink in hand and a nice cozy seat where I have plugged in my laptop and begun chugging.
Typically speaking, I am always willing to pay a little more for VIP privileges. But I won’t “shmooze” for them. What this leads me to believe in the evaluation of my own consumer context is that my motivations are not that of ego, but of the lack of patience and need for comfort that comes with age. And I’m no old lady, but I am also over the days of standing in lines to get into a bar or sitting on the airport floor and staking out power sources. In the same vein I will pay a little extra in most situations for convenience.
BUT if you would have asked me the questions ten years ago, I know my motivations would have been different: although I wouldn’t have admitted it. Probably because ego-driven need for VIP status smacks of inauthenticity. And it would have been spot on because in my mid twenties I really didn’t entirely know who I was…so being my authentic self was difficult and being validated by others as “important” was something I sought.
These days I am pretty settled in my identity and detest shmoozery. Be your authentic self and get what’s coming to you one way or another is the way I feel about it. And if your authentic self has some extra cash then go ahead and pay for the upgrade if you feel like it. But don’t fool yourself…you are no more important than the next guy with a Platinum Amex. But hopefully you are comfortable enough in your skin not to care.
The Narcissistic (American) Anthropologist 