Not enough money. Not enough time. Not enough land. Not enough bedrooms. Not enough freedom.
“If I only had more…I would be happy!”
Not true.
Being content with life now does so much. It allows us to be more present. Less concerned with what is currently not obtained and more concerned with what is.
This concept is something I have shrugged off for the past five or so years. What I had was never enough and I was determined to get what I wanted. I became a “side hustle” nerd. Trying everything. Spending countless hours and thousands of dollars on creating an additional stream of income. A noble pursuit, yes, but necessary? No.
My only debt was and is my mortgage and a small (compared to others) school loan. My living expenses are covered every month and then some. My family does not go hungry ever and we have comfort in both cold and winter months. We literally have everything we need. We have enough.
(My primary goal was (and is) being debt free. That’s where the determination came from. But at what cost? Time (probably thousands of hours over the past five years) away from my family. “I am working hard for my family, the one I never see.” The debt is there, yes, and I will get rid of it, but at a slower pace. I’m going to stop forcing the additional income stream.)
So, then, my mind asks the question: if enough is enough, and we need to be satisfied with that so that we can be more present and still, was all of that time and money spent on a goal of additional income a waste?
I think the answer is no. It was all a part of growing up, for me. Trying things that I had to try, and that I was going to try eventually. I had to “get it out of my system.” It was then or later. They all failed in the sense that they did not accomplish the goal of additional income, but they were all a success in that they taught me a lot that I did not I know before I started, and they ultimately brought me to the place I am trying to get to now. A place of focusing on one thing, being content with the skills, knowledge, interests, and gifts that I have been given.
Our past is necessary for the present in that it brought us to where we are now. That does not mean it takes us to our next destination in life, but it was an influence. And that is valuable, as lessons in life are learned in both the good times and the “bad”, and we must use those lessons to be better today than we were yesterday, and better tomorrow than we are today.
