Live More Want Less

Live More Want Less

I have been acknolowding a self-transformation in the past couple of months as I experience the joy of travel one more time and feel a sense of accomplishment that fills my heart and mind with constant happiness. As I write this post in a small island in Thailand is funny how fully satisfied I feel in this very moment. I do not have many possessions with me at this time other than my laptop on where I’m writing this, a couple of electronic gadgets, some days worth of clothing and a pair of shoes, and yet I feel that I have everything that I would ever need. Live More Want Less.

Last night when we arrived in Koh-Samui after a tedious long day of travel, sitting in the beach at night I asked Vicky what we would feel if by any chance we get the bad news that all of our stuff got burned in the storage room back in the US (let’s hope this does not happen) and we both answered the same thing. Nothing! It is hard to explain the sense of detachment from all of our things, but this is the true; if we were to lose all of our material possessions our lives will not change much. We are both still in good health and able to work in whatever we put our minds into, by working hard we could get everything back , but the one thing that we could never get back is all of the experiences that we are currently living.

Our current culture has thought us that we are what we own, this is why we get very attached to all of our possessions. It is sad to see many people believing this ton of crap, and actually giving away the best years in our lives buying into it. I have given my fair share of hard working days and savings to buy all of the unnecessary toys and gadgets that I thought were going to make me happier, and as I do enjoy watching the game on the large screen and listening to music on the near perfect sound of a nice pair of speakers and subwoofers I now understand that we should enjoy these things as we can afford them but we should not give our days and lives to finding happiness in the material things that we own.

Because of all of this, lately I have actually started to want less (as far as material things go) some people call it minimalism. And don’t get me wrong, I still work hard and I still aspire to accomplish a lot in life, but now I feel that success is not measured in expensive cars, clothes and homes or large numbers in your bank account, (which is the standard measure in most countries today) but by the level of happiness that you experience in life.

My new equation for life is Success=Happiness !

Many people spend countless hours day-dreaming of the many things that we want to do in life that sometimes we forget to enjoy the very moment we are living (The Present is All We Have). Be happy and grateful if you and your loved ones have good health and love each other, enjoy the company of good friends and that you can afford to buy a beer on the weekend. Stop and enjoy the simple moments, let’s stop wanting so much all the time. We do not realize sometimes that we have everything we ever need, if you are reading this, I’m pretty sure you have a nice place to sleep tonight and some food in the fridge. I know it’s hard since everywhere you look you see the expensive car ads, the high end luxury clothes and jewelry in the mall, but we have the ability to focus and find out what really makes us happy and do it as often as we can.

As I enjoy the simple things that not even money can buy (good times with your loved ones for example) I wonder how is it that we bought the story of more money equals more happiness.

When we get old and grey 😉 most of us will regret of all the things we wanted to do in this short time of life we have, not of all the things we did not get to buy… At the end of the day we should focus to live more want less.

Picture of Thai Baths inside a Buddhist Temple in Koh Samui, Thailand.