Received this article in an email newsletter I belong to. Very fitting on this day. I’m trying harder and harder to get caught up financially from a rought previous year. As anyone that’s been in this position before, I’m sure you can relate. Anyway, this felt good to read and remind me of what’s important and how I should be looking at life. I truly feel I’ve learned this lesson, now if I can just pay-off the results of the years it’s taken me to learn it. Anyway, here’s the story.
Henry David Thoreau spent most of his life writing about man’s attempt to find truth and meaning through simplified living. At some point he discovered he could live within the harmony and beauty of nature with a clear conscience and only work six weeks a year to support his lifestyle.
Henry found it difficult to find a teaching job that matched his style so he worked briefly in his father’s pencil factory. At age 28, Thoreau built a small house (actual cost $28.12) on Walden Pond and began to devote his time to his writing. Advocating the simple life, his ‘Walden’ journey began with: ‘I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately..’
This does not describe the typical journey of a college graduate today. Rather, the expectation is an immediate six figure income and the lifestyle that accompanies ‘success.’ We live in a society that embraces indulgent consumption as a visible status symbol. The fabulous house tells everyone you have arrived, even if it takes two incomes and being trapped in an unfulfilling job to make it work. The house then sets the expectations for the country club membership, private schools for the children and attendance at the right social events. We work longer hours to pay for the new ‘stuff’ and then have less time to enjoy it. We plead with God to bless us, but the only relief from the self-imposed pressure would be to win the lottery.
Where do we draw the line on consumption if we can ‘afford’ the extras? Do you really need all the house you ‘qualify’ for? Should we really thank God for providing when we finance a car purchase equal to an annual income? Is a vacation in the Caribbean that much more satisfying than spending a week on a needy Indian reservation? How can we give generously when payments are overdue?
Perhaps we, like Thoreau, could take time to savor the beauty of nature around us and to smell the fresh roses of everyday life.
‘Simplify, simplify.’ ‘I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.’
>From the Bible:
‘Give me neither poverty nor riches! Give me just enough to satisfy my needs! For if I grow rich, I may become content without God. And if I am too poor, I may steal, and thus insult God’s holy name.’ Proverbs 30:8-9 (TLB)
God, keep me focused as I continue to see my life and this world through far-from-rose-colored glasses. Help me to be faithful and as importantly at this point, content with what I have and remember that I am still truly blessed to have it.