I read this story the other day and thought I would share...
A fisherman lived on a tropical island. He fished for his family and had plenty of time to play with his children, to enjoy the beauty around him and to be a good neighbor.
A yacht arrived carrying a wealthy entrepreneur. The fisherman took him out for a day’s fishing.
As the day went on the entrepreneur looked at the beautiful island with its silver sand fringed with palm trees, the calm blue sea filled with a rainbow of darting fish and saw the opportunity for development and making lots of money.
He was a magnanimous man so he thought he must help the fisherman by offering him the idea, so he said to the fisherman, “Why don’t you build a hotel and encourage tourists to come to the island...?”
“A hotel...?” the fisherman asked perplexed.
“Yes, a hotel,” the businessman said, “In fact you should build a holiday village with a sports complex so people can come and relax. It could be so successful that you could build an air strip so you can offer the whole package to the tourists so you can cut out the middle man and make even greater profits.”
“Why should I do that...?” asked the fisherman.
“You would make lots of money and be rich of course...!” replied the entrepreneur.
“How long would it take...?” asked the fisherman
“I would think it would take ten years to be really successful,” answered the entrepreneur.
“What would I do with all that money...?” inquired the fisherman.
“You could go on exotic holidays to a beautiful island where you could fish, play with your children and have plenty of time to enjoy the beauty all around you” replied the entrepreneur.
“But that is exactly what I am doing now, isn’t it...?” asked the bewildered fisherman.
The fisherman does not have a lot from the perspective of the businessman but he does not feel deprived because he meets each moment satisfied, able to see beauty and abundance of his life. Where most people would find deprivation and boredom, the fisherman finds contentment. In contrast the businessman’s longing for the “next big thing” leaves him with the illusion that there is always something better than what he is experiencing now.
Our society makes it very difficult find contentment. We are inundated with marketing ploys aimed at making us believe that their products are going to make us happier, wealthier, skinnier and more beautiful. But the truth is, true freedom and contentment begins when we view all things as they are, and stop spending all of our energy trying to manipulate things to our preferences. Oscar Wilde said, “there are two kinds of unhappiness in the world. One is not getting what you want; the other is getting what you want.”
There is a Chinese proverb that, “people in the west are always getting ready to live but never living.” This is strikingly true, we are constantly waiting for the perfect time to start living our lives. As children, we can’t wait to grow up and then we can’t wait to graduate school and then live on our own and start our careers and then go on vacation and finally retire. When we are constantly waiting for our lives to start we will never be content. We also tend to compare our lives to other people’s lives to see what is missing from our own. When we do this we only move ourselves further away from fulfillment. By expecting the world to meet our needs, expecting our jobs to meet our needs, and our partners to fulfill us, we just keep playing the “if only” game. Looking outwards for fulfillment will only ever leave us feeling helpless and disappointed. Incorporating gratitude practices into our daily lives centers us in the joy of our own lives and protects us from becoming stuck in the trivialities of life. Have you ever thought of starting a daily gratitude practice?