I often compose these essays after returning from a ride or completing a garage project, but today’s thoughts come on the heels of a pre-Christmas shopping spree. All of Santa’s presents have been funneled down the chimney and a bundle of money has traveled in the opposite direction—up in smoke! While there’s usually queasiness about such a spike in spending, there’s also a certain raw joy in the procurement process itself, even when the gifts are for others. Of course, there’s additional pleasure in anticipating recipients’ reactions and in giving to those we love, but here I’ll focus on the sheer act of acquisition, and what it does for us psychologically.

Motorcycling is not a cheap hobby. Bikes—even used ones—are increasingly expensive to purchase. Maintenance and repair costs can be shockingly high, and then there are the discretionary outlays for accessories and gear. “Discretionary” is a slippery notion in this case, since gear is an absolute requirement and machine customization is vital to the enjoyment of motorcycling for many riders. Nevertheless, people have some leeway in how much and what quality gear they buy, along with the extent and pacing of their bike modifications. Aside from situations wherein someone must use a motorcycle as the only form of transportation they can afford, all money spent in this domain is completely optional; we invest in it because we’re recreational enthusiasts, not out of necessity.

I’m always struck by the odd twinge of happiness I feel when purchasing the most mundane motorcycle-related items. I don’t mean I lose my mind over bringing home a bottle of oil, but I definitely notice a subtle tingling inside, a faint sense of excitement about putting it to use or the satisfaction of having a well-stocked inventory of supplies. It’s easy to understand the thrill of getting new high-tech equipment or a fancy farkle that will improve the riding experience, but the enjoyment of acquiring moto stuff seems to extend all the way down to the smallest purchases: just picking up a replacement fastener at the hardware store feels good—not as good as swapping an old helmet for a much better modern one, but it’s still a curiously pleasant feeling. What’s going on here?

“Retail therapy” is the process of fending off negative emotions by spending money on treats that distract us from our woes. Such purchases might offset a sense of loss or prove a type of autonomous independence in contrast to an experience of helpless need somewhere else. Buying things obviously doesn’t cure those other ills, but it can offer transient, compensatory relief. Overreliance on this method of keeping depression or anxiety at bay might make one a “shopaholic,” continuously hemorrhaging money in an effort to outrun (outspend) unwanted feelings. Motorcycling expenditures can definitely serve this purpose, but I want to explore the non-pathological level, a version that’s not a compulsive flight from intolerable emotions but still contains hidden motivations.

I’ll start with some concepts from the renowned father of hidden motivations, Sigmund Freud. As I’ve asserted in past essays, the one-dimensional caricature most people associate with Freud is both grossly inaccurate and vastly incomplete. I won’t lecture on this topic now, but please suspend whatever reflexive dismissals you may be inclined to apply. I’m not a strict devotee of Freud, but I do find many of his ideas compelling. Some have become embedded in popular culture and your own thinking in ways you may not fully appreciate. Others seem like farfetched psychobabble at first, but make more sense with a little explanation. What follows is certainly an oversimplification, but it’ll provide background for this discussion.

The pejorative term “anal” is frequently used in reference to people who are uptight and rigidly controlling. This is a fragment from Freud’s model of early childhood development. The anal stage is a product of “potty training,” wherein children get focused on controlling their bowel movements, feeling pride as they achieve this new mastery over their bodily functions and shame when they fail. “Anal” in common parlance is more precisely a sub-category of anal stage dynamics called “anal-retentive.” This refers to the child who’s overly intent on holding in their feces, usually as a means of avoiding the embarrassment of losing control and suffering parental disapproval. Later in life, this tendency translates into a wide variety of analogous situations wherein the person takes great pride in maintaining very high levels of control and feels excessive shame about any lapses thereof. A contrasting sub-category is “anal-expulsive,” which you’d correctly guess is the opposite of anal-retentive. Here, the child may delight in the spontaneous, explosive release of feces, perhaps as an angry rebellion against parental demands or simply an indulgence in pleasurable evacuation. We’ve all known adults who seem to revel in (figuratively) sh*tting on things around them, defiantly or arrogantly, or who actually prefer messy disorganization, even when it runs counter to their own apparent interests (covert emotional factors can outweigh overt pragmatic concerns).

Freud traced most adult issues back to formative, prototypical experiences in childhood that were no longer readily accessible to memory, yet remained highly influential in terms of ingrained perceptual biases, emotional reactions and behavioral patterns. As the twig is bent, so grows the tree, regardless of its lack of awareness. In classical Freudian psychoanalysis (there are post-Freudian variants), money can be a later analog of feces, with people hell-bent on holding onto it or impulsively “blowing it out” based on personality traits formed during the anal stage. We’ll come back to this aspect shortly, but first let’s review an earlier stage of development in Freud’s model, the “oral” stage.

Initially, much of an infant’s life is centered around feeding. Feelings of hunger and satiation, with the attendant comforts of being held at the mother’s breast, comprise a huge proportion of their earliest concerns and carry life-or-death consequences. As such, the distress of hunger is extremely intense, prompting babies to scream with all their might to urge a caregiver to provide relief; their life depends on it, quite literally. One element of oral dynamics is the blissful sense of safety and contentment derived from being in a passive-receptive position. Being cared for and having our needs met without having to do anything but signal desire is a profoundly delicious experience, but one we typically must learn to do without as we’re expected to become increasingly self-reliant growing up. This happens in a multitude of ways during childhood and adolescence (and, sadly, throughout much of adulthood!), but the earliest example is weaning. Feelings of deprivation can produce existential terror and aggressive greed—now we don’t just take in passively, we bite! Paradoxically, this is apt to make our mother (and others later) less inclined to give us what we want, creating a vicious cycle that won’t stop until insight and the development of guilt inspire a change in approach.

You don’t have to buy into Freud’s belief that much of adult emotion and motivation is shaped during early childhood; just think of these paradigms as bodily metaphors, a poetic way of capturing key elements of common emotional dynamics. Keep in mind these can be viewed as ubiquitous undercurrents of everyday human experiences, with more extreme versions in a person’s history leading to “fixations” later in life wherein associated themes become preoccupations and sources of irrational anxiety—what Freud called “neuroses.” The normal, non-neurotic level shares the same roots but isn’t as problematic. Okay, back to the joy of buying things, especially motorcycle stuff.

There are two sides to purchasing goodies: we spend money (triggering anal phase-related feelings) and we acquire products or services (triggering oral phase-related feelings). Anxiety about spending may be based on concrete budgetary facts—plain old math—but in the absence of any realistic danger people can still feel anxious and/or ashamed about relaxing their usual self-restraint. This may produce inhibitions, proactively thwarting spontaneity in favor of control. One type of enjoyment is sacrificed, but the self-discipline involved can be a source of pride and feel reassuringly safe. If the impulse is indulged despite self-imposed prohibitions, worry and self-reproach may subtract from the fun afterward, regardless of it having no significant impact on financial well-being. It’s not really (or only) about the money, but whether or not release is deemed acceptable.

Alternatively, someone may find spending exhilarating in itself, with the items purchased of secondary importance; it just feels great to “let loose” and suspend routine constraints. This is often what holidays and vacations allow, but the same principle applies to smaller-scale splurges, even when they’re necessitated by something bad. Hence, a rider might notice a vaguely positive feeling after paying for a big, unexpected repair. They didn’t want to spend their money on a surprise drain, yet there’s a certain satisfaction involved. The outflow of money isn’t the only relevant part. There’s also the elimination (pun intended) of “badness”—the stinky situation of a broken motorcycle—achieved via expenditure. “That hurt, but I’m glad to have expelled the problem!” In the abstract, these are all fundamentally analogous to managing our poop. We may lean toward anal-retentiveness or anal-expulsiveness in general, but there’s also a normal oscillation between self-restraint and unrestrained spontaneity, with each position delivering its own rewards and the former setting us up to take extra pleasure in the latter. Of course, healthy adult functioning features a balance of both.

Acquisitions are analogs of food. Being the passive recipient of a gift is one version, which can bring a warm sense of security and of being valued in a relationship. But obtaining things on our own generates a different gratification, that of feeling powerfully self-sufficient; we needn’t rely on others to meet our needs, we can take care of (feed) ourselves. Depending on how deprived or satisfied we feel in general, we’ll take a more or less aggressive approach to collecting supplies. If we’ve suffered severe lack in the past, we’re more likely to ravenously hoard going forward and jealously protect our belongings (material or relational) from competitors. But even in the most benign situations, it feels good to have our basic needs covered and any surplus is comforting. Some people are perpetually afraid of not having enough, even when they already possess what seems like plenty to an impartial observer. Others are content with minimal accumulation. The objective quantity of resources can be virtually irrelevant; again, emotional factors outweigh rational considerations. Whether we’re talking about the necessity of milk to an infant or meat and berries to a hunter-gatherer tribe, human beings are hard-wired to ACQUIRE! as part of our inborn, evolutionarily adaptive survival instinct. This began as the pursuit of life-sustaining food, but the drive has been elaborated across numerous other domains. So, the (hungry) excitement of receiving an ordered accessory is partly a function of our most basic orientation to the world as a source of sustenance. Although maturation hopefully brings much greater complexity to this orientation, obtaining consumables is the original imperative of existence.

Since motorcycling is an intensely emotional activity, everything related to it carries strong, personal meaning. A purchase here not only promises additional pleasure during future use but also provides a more potent sense of autonomy, independence and security than purchases made in less highly charged realms. We won’t literally consume that bottle of oil, but it’s extra tasty as a psychological snack. If an acquisition also involves a blow-out expenditure, we might enjoy it even more. Freud would say eating and pooping are the underground foundations of many of life’s pleasures, including this aspect of motorcycling. Enjoy both ends of digestion!

The Ride Inside with Mark Barnes is brought to you by the MOA Foundation. You can join the BMW Motorcycle Owners of America quickly and easily to better take advantage of the Paul B. Grant and Clark Luster training reimbursement programs offered by the Foundation.