Quotes about Contentment

6Now godliness with econtentment is great gain. 7For we brought nothing into this world, 4and it is fcertain we can carry nothing out. 8And having food and clothing, with these we shall be gcontent.

Your concern is not so much to have what you love anymore, but to love what you have—right now. This is a monumental change from the first half of life, so much so that it is almost the litmus test of whether you are in the second half of life at all.

In my experience, if you are not radically grateful every day, resentment always takes over.

I am not preoccupied with collecting more goods and services; quite simply, my desire and effort—every day—is to pay back, to give back to the world a bit of what I have received.

Your concern is not so much to have what you love anymore, but to love what you have—right now.

Know that things are okay as they are. This moment is as perfect as it can be. The saints called this the "sacrament of the present moment.

We have moved to a level where we have made happiness and contentment largely impossible. We have created a pseudo-happiness, largely based in having instead of being. We are so overstimulated that the ordinary no longer delights us. We cannot rest or abide in our naked being in God, as Jesus offers us.

Governments encourage this pacification by various distractions, what used to be called "bread and circuses." They know it will keep us small, content, and uninterested in those "weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and good faith" (Matthew 23:23) that have attracted all great souls. A

In the second half of life, we are not demanding our American constitutional right to the pursuit of happiness or that people must have our same experiences; rather, simple meaning now suffices, and that becomes in itself a much deeper happiness. As the body cannot live without food, so the soul cannot live without meaning.

It is strange that when people have so much, they are so anxious about not having enough—to do, to see, to own, to fix, to control, to change.

Live simply so that others may simply live.

Your value is not determined by your valuables, and God says the most valuable things in life are not things!