Ten years ago if someone had asked me what my preferred lifestyle would be it would involved a description of houses, cars, classes of travel, holidays and vacations, clothes, techie gadgets etc. Today everything that at one point seemed so important and necessary has become virtually secondary to my real needs. Having achieved a certain level of comfort in the physical sphere, so to speak I’ve now come to realise that my wants will never be satisfied. And that my wants rarely satisfy me, if ever. Hence, if one were to look at a supposed happiness quotient per se I do not believe that I would be able to find any of these in my wants and desires list. My happiness today is derived mostly from my needs and what I need is rarely what I want.

To me the single greatest luxury at this point of my existence is merely time. Time for myself, time with my family, time alone with my wife. Time that I would be able to spend on some of my more off-the-chart pursuits, i.e, my music, my passion for travel to the more exotic corners of the planet, my passion for collectible antiques, my passion for my dogs even! All of these are today real luxuries.

Suddenly it is not so important to be in Paris, New York, Tokyo or even Sydney. It is probably far more important and meaningful to be just at home. To be able to laze about at home pottering around one of my hobbies, playing with my dogs, recalibrating my fountain (a perpetual challenge) or just even spending time with the kids. Hence, my lifestyle requirements have drastically taken a U-Turn. Having said this, it is no nice to be able to walk into a music store and pick up 70 CDs and DVDs and not even remembering how much I paid for it. Its nice to travel First Class and I do not believe I would ever find economy all that appetising. I don’t think I would be interested in travelling if It required to travel coach. As brazenly arrogant as it may sound, all of these things were earned at great sacrifice and great commitment. And to savour the fruits of your labour is wonderful just as much as it is for a farmer to taste a fruit from his own orchard. The actual fruit being irrelevant, the taste coming from merely having achieved. To me, the greatest wealth of all that I have been able to acquire has been that of the wealth of experience. It is irreplaceable. Knowing that I can do this, that I have done this, that if required I can still do it, yet again, is something that is extremely gratifying. But I think the greatest lesson of all has been in understanding that ultimately all of this would not have been possible without His Grace.

Despite everything that I have put into this, and despite the tremendous sacrifices by so many others, I am fully aware that if at all, I live and draw breath in this world of my making, it has been of His making. And I think, that is the greatest lesson learnt. The true wealth is peace of mind. And one can only aspire to achieve this from within and from His Grace. Everything else is temporary.

So, I do not begrudge a single moment of pain nor do I desire or wish to savour a single ounce of gain without first acknowledging, that my greatest wealth of all has been my personal journey with the Lord. If I feel at all fulfilled today, it’s in the knowledge that I have served to the best of my ability. That is truly wealth I can keep.