“He who loves silver will not be satisfied with silver; nor he who loves abundance, with increase. This also is vanity.” — Ecclesiastes 5:10
I think Americans are generally uncomfortable with limits. Ours is a consumeristic culture: we want unlimited options; we want what we want, when we want it, and for the cheapest price possible.
We apply this consumeristic mindset to other aspects of life, too. We want to have accomplished careers and idyllic family lives. We want the promotion with the corner office and the healthy marriage, comfortable home, and well-adjusted children (of which we want one boy and one girl, of course, so that we don’t miss out on raising either gender). And, just as we have a list that guides us in the grocery store, when we act as consumers of life itself, it feels like our lives become ruled by an invisible checklist: impressive job title? Check. Spouse and kids? Check. Three-bedroom house? Check. Vacation condo in Florida? Check.
Of course, having any or all of those things is not inherently destructive. It’s good to believe in ourselves, follow our passions, and try to do something meaningful and fulfilling with our lives.
There is danger, however, when completing the invisible checklist becomes the endgame. It’s harmful when the checklist weighs so heavily over our lives that our goals and desires overshadow what we have in the present. This kind of thinking is easy to slip into: “Once I finally get [blank], then I’ll be happy,” or “I’ll know I’ve really made it when I finally [blank].” I often lose sight of the good things God has given me here and now by fretting over what someone else has (or appears to have, from my biased and limited perspective), and the only real result of that is more anxiety and dissatisfaction. It is idolatry: I worship achievements, experiences, and myself. I expect these things to make me happy and whole. I know this, but I do it anyway.
Maybe life isn’t all about “having it all.” There’s a quote from a Maurice Sendak book that goes, “There must be more to life than having everything.”
