As you near retirement the question “Do I have enough to retire?” looms large.  You’ve worked all your life but still there is that gnawing feeling that you haven’t done enough.

It’s time to ask yourself a different question – What is your wealth? – and recognize the riches that are in your life.

The story of the farmer

There was once a very rich and wealthy family, the father took his young son on a trip out into the countryside, he took him there to show him how the poor people lived and to help him understand his level of wealth. The two of them spent several days on the farm of what they would consider a poor family. After those days they returned home. When they got back home, the father asked his son,

“So what did you think of our trip? Did you see how the poor people lived?

What did you learn about your wealth?”

The son responded, “It was great Dad. Yes I did, I saw that we have a cat and a dog, but that they have many of both, I saw that we have a swimming pool in our garden and a trampoline and lovely deck for parties, but they have fields that seem to have no end, and a creek that flows into a lake. We have electric lights in our back garden, and our patio extends around the side of the house and to our neighbour’s wall, but they have all the stars in the night sky, and they have the whole horizon.”

“Our home is large on a small plot of land; they have the farmhouse, and many outbuildings and rolling fields that go beyond our sight. A house maid and a nanny help us, but they all help others. We buy our food from the local stores, they grow it!”

The father was quiet. Then his son said,

“Dad, thank you for showing me how poor we are compared to the wealth of their lives!”

What is your real wealth?

Have an honest true look at your own life. Are you so busy trying to get to the next goal, to the next level that you haven’t actually realised… stopped to be grateful for what you have right now? Your wealth? Fed, watered, loved by someone? Working? Playing? Experience? Education?

Measure your life not by what you haven’t got, what you haven’t achieved, but instead by what you have. [Read more…]