MORE IS NEVER ENOUGH

Our two-year old grandson, Carter is in daycare while his parents work. He is learning yoga, sign-language, the alphabet and is being potty-trained among the other learning activities that the program provides. One of the first signs Carter learned was the one for “more”, meaning he wanted more food. Now Carter likes to eat. He always has. Thus, as concerned grandparents, one being a very health-conscious nurse, we were afraid that he would put on too much weight.

We needn’t have worried. Yes, Carter did sign for more (he now simply asks) when he wanted more, but he also shook his head and waved his hands when he had eaten enough. He knew when he needed more to fill his stomach and he knew when he had had his fill. He still does. I wish I had learned that lesson at Carter’s age. It’s still a lesson I all-to-often forget when it comes to food.

Don’t we all? We seem to want more and more and more and, at the same time, never know when we’ve had enough. That is true not only when it comes to filling our stomachs but in all of life. We live in a society that screams out to us that we can never have enough, that we can always use more, that, in fact, we do need more – more of whatever it is that has our attention at the moment.

Worse, still, is that when we have accumulated more than we ever need, we have a very difficult time letting go of some of it to share with those who need what we have but, in truth, no longer need because we already have enough, truly more than enough. The solution to the problem, once we understand that having more will never be enough and that chasing after more and more, is to let go of the chase after more before the chase even begins.

That is difficult, again, not only because of the society in which we live that tells us that more is better and society will think better of us the more we have, but also because we enjoy the pleasure that comes from the attaining of more, whatever that more is. It is a double-edged whammy. We fight the exterior forces that tell us we need more and the interior forces that give us pleasure in having more.

My hope for Carter is that he has already learned that when he really needs more, he will get more and that when he knows he has had enough, he will not ask for more. That lesson, once learned and made part of his life, will serve him well throughout the rest of his life. Unfortunately it seems to be a lesson we only learn as we enter the later stages of our lives almost when it is too late to do us much good.

I am thankful that my two-year-old grandson has taught me a lesson, or at least reminded me of a lesson I should never forget. I am even so bold as to suggest it is a lesson we all need to remember and certainly practice. Life will be more enjoyable if we do.