There is so much to be gained by slowing down, focusing on what you can be grateful for, and not striving for more.
> There's an expression on Wall Street, often attributed to Warren Buffett, which goes, "They don't ring a bell at the top." There's tremendous wisdom in that adage, because while in retrospect it's easy to pinpoint the day that the market (or even a specific stock) reached an all-time high that looks unlikely to ever be attained again in the foreseeable future, at the moment it happened it was impossible to recognize. That's because, unlike market bottoms, which usually have a crescendo feeling to them accompanied by investor panic, a market top generally passes without fanfare, indistinguishable from the series of tops that preceded it.
> You know when else they don't ring a bell? For parents, they don't ring a bell the last time you read Goodnight Moon. They don't do it the last time you watch Sleeping Beauty and they don't do it the last time you help your daughter put on the same article of clothing she's wanted to wear every day as a toddler. Instead, a couple years after the fact, you find the book on a shelf, the DVD in a box, and the tights with the pink ballerinas on them in the back of a drawer. You can't for the life of you remember the last time you read the book, danced to "Once Upon a Dream" with your daughter on your feet, or helped put those tights on. But you do know that now she reads to herself at bedtime, she dances, alone, to Taylor Swift, and the tights—well, the tights wouldn't even make it over her knees.
Some of the days have been very, very long. The weeks, months, and years have been so short.
we were desiged to want more it impossible to override that design.
Yes, wanting "More" [time, money, love, status] is pretty firmly ingrained as an advantageous trait. But you can override your instincts (e.g. declining a drink when thirsty, if you learn the glass of water contains poison). And it is possible to learn to want what you already have.
How? Practice three things: Compassion, Attention, and Gratitude. (Pick any two, and the third will follow almost automatically.)
That's the central thesis of an excellent book, "How to Want What You Have" by Dr Timothy Miller. It changed my life.
The interpretation of this I love most is the visual of a sheep, satisfied enough that they lay down instead of grazing or drinking. This posture is mentioned repeatedly in the Bible.
I imagine most religions and philosophies have similar.
This is a hard teaching and not all can accept it. Those that do will find peace, life, meaning, and rest.
says who?