My 5 year old has started asking big questions. He wants to understand why we have boyfriends and girlfriends, he wants to know what grass is made of, how trees make oxygen and where people go when they die. On the drive to school the other day he asked me, “Mummy, is money important?”. I thanked him for such an interesting question, buying time to figure out how to answer it in a way that he might understand! And, in a way that felt right to me because quite frankly, this is a question I actually ponder quite regularly!! So I briefly explained that we need money to pay for things like rent, food, petrol, nice holidays, fun days out, birthday presents etc. I said that money was more important in some parts of the world than others and we talked a little about Africa and how the poor people there meet their basic needs without money and how money would make it easier for them to get food, a house and education. And then I explained that although money is important in many ways, there are lots of things even more important than money, like being happy, healthy and having people to love and who love you. I asked him his thoughts and he said, “I think heart, the world and love is more important than money”. I nearly crashed the car! Honestly, sometimes that child comes out with the most Dalai Lama-esque quotes. Sure, I talk a lot about love – it’s what my work is all about – so naturally he picks up on that. His addition of the word heart really touched me. As did the enormity of the word, world. Honestly, children have such a wondrous capacity for love and it stretches far beyond themselves. They seem to see the needs of our world with such obvious simplicity and quite frankly, it’s a wonderful breath of fresh air to accept the truth of such simplicity. I mean let’s be honest, if we all prioritised love, heart and the world over money, we probably wouldn’t need money to have lives that were joyful and healthy. But that’s a whole other conversation…..
Today, I choose to focus on the simplicity of my son’s message. It quiets my mind, centres my soul and brings me back to my truth.
Will you join me in absorbing the truth of these words?
“Heart, the World and Love are more important than Money”
