Today’s quote from The Wisdom of Alpacas is from James Oppenheim, “THE FOOLISH MAN SEEKS HAPPINESS IN THE DISTANCE, THE WISE GROWS IT UNDER HIS FEET.”

One of my personal core values is contentment. For me contentment is about learning to both accept what is and to transform even that which is not good into something useful and blessed. As a Christian I believe even the most difficult things can be redeemed. That doesn’t mean I think that everything can be fixed. Lord knows I have experienced things in my own life which could not be fixed no matter how much I wished they could be.

For me accepting the brokenness of things is the first step in contentment. The second is figuring out whether the thing can be or maybe even should be fixed.

I THINK THAT SOME THINGS SHOULDN’T BE FIXED. WHAT DO YOU THINK?

The third step in contentment is discovering what good can come from the broken things of life when they are mixed with the whole things of life.

I think of contentment like baking a cake. It is taking all of life’s ingredients and making something good out of them. It is not as some people think giving up or settling for the status quo.

Paul the apostle said “godliness with contentment is great gain.” I think that is the biblical idea behind Oppenheim’s comment. I can choose to keep looking into the distance for some bit of happiness forever out of my reach or I can make my own life the source of my happiness. Contentment is one of the ways I make my own life my main source of joy.

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT OPPENHEIM’S COMMENT?

WHAT WOULD YOU ADD TO A CONVERSATION ON CONTENTMENT?