Contentment

Once upon a time, there was a girl that was born into a lower middle income family. She had all her needs met but not her all wants met which is sort of fine. One can't have everything in life. When she hit fifteen, her richer friends had Guess bags and she told herself that once she's able to buy that Guess bag, she'll be very happy.

So she got herself a part time job and subsequently she got herself a Guess bag. Well, she should be happy now, right? She was for the time being. Then she saw her friends with Coach bags and she thought to herself, yes, a Coach bag would make me happy. So at twenty, she got herself a Coach bag. Life went on, then she noticed, maybe a Kate Spade bag would make me happy now. And yes, she went to get herself one. And then she thought, maybe Gucci now, will make her happy.

Well, bags after bags and each bag more expensive than the last one. But at the end of the day, did the bag make her happy? Only the girl has the answer.

Well, the main character girl in the story could be me or anyone. I shared this analogy with a friend when we were talking about contentment. Yes, we set financial or material goals for ourselves and once we hit that goal, are we truly happy? And what makes us happy, honestly?

I used to have a shopping habit. Noticed that I used the word 'used'. When I first started working, I would shop whenever I felt down. To me, if I buy something, it would make me happy. Just that something. So sometimes it could be a lipstick, or sometimes a skirt or sometimes a bag. And if I had a really bad day, the purchases would be more. Yes, that moment of buying made me happy and then the purchases would be forgotten and when my credit card bills appear, my heart would sink and then the cycle would repeat. Was I really happy? No, I wasn't. I learnt the hard way. When I was moving to Hong Kong, I gave some of my stuff away. And some of my stuff still had price tags on it. It was after moving to Hong Kong that I learnt that stuff are stuff and stuff don't make me happy.

Yes, stuff don't make me happy. This morning on my facebook status I wrote this, 'I just realized that if I wore a different outfit every day, it would take more than a month more me to go through my wardrobe'. Well, this is excluding my winter clothes. Yes, I've that much of clothes. But do my clothes make me happy? No, I'm very proud to say that I'm now contented with whatever that I have. I've learnt over the years that God has so richly provided for me and material stuff does not make me happy. I am contented.

Recently, I told Babe that I was going to buy a bag from a store. He looked at me and laughed and said this, 'You do realize that I can afford to buy you a more expensive bag?' Well, the bag that I wanted was something like HK350 which is like SIN$60ish. Babe buys most of my bags. But I told him no. That bag that I wanted was big enough for me to carry to work. It could contain my Macbook and my lunch and if and when I get my Ipad, it would fit too. So I happily bought it and brought it to work. And I've found contentment. For the record, I never had a Guess bag.