Reject materialism that blinds humanity to what matters
Dear Tingasiga;
I am physically very exhausted as I write. My wife and I have spent the better part of a month sorting and packing our worldly possessions in preparation for downsizing our accommodation and lifestyle.
Yes, there comes a time when a couple’s modest-size home that once buzzed with sounds of children and their friends becomes a near-silent empty nest with only two occupants. They call us empty-nesters in these parts, a polite avoidance of the real term for us: Aging folk whose adult children have moved on with their lives.
It was not hard to decide to sell our current home in which we have lived for 17 years. When the distance between rooms seems to grow longer; when the stairs from the basement to the main house become steeper and steeper; when the prospect of a trip up those stairs routinely triggers bad thoughts about Sir Isaac Newton, he of those unchangeable laws of physics, or consideration of mathematical concepts like the Fibonacci Sequence; and when one postpones emptying one’s bladder because a trip to the bathroom appears to be a long distance affair, one does not need persuasion to decamp to smaller quarters.
To do so has required parting with most of our furniture and other possessions that were designed to be accommodated in a medium sized house. Happily, it has been very easy to do.
Whereas I enjoy the convenience of owning and using nice material things, I do so with the knowledge that they are meaningless, perishable possessions that have nothing to do with happiness or the core of my being. It is only the memories I associate with these things that matter.
That is why I do not get attached to material things, even a beautiful house that we have thoroughly enjoyed living in. Instead, I look forward to the happiness and created memories that tomorrow’s experiences will bring. It may surprise some who know my love affair with vinyl records and books to learn that I have no emotional attachment to them. It is the music and the knowledge that matters, not the physical media in which those treasures are stored.
Indeed, I have lost many records and books during our moves since my hurried departure from Uganda in 1977. All I had that last day of August 1977 was my life, a strong faith in God, an intact mind, and a solid education that was convertible currency on the international professional market.
My few material possessions that I left behind did not matter one bit. Their replacements and additional possessions over the years have not changed my view about material things: Useful, yes, but inconsequential.
My wife and I started to reaccumulate material possessions in Lesotho. By the time we semi-settled in Dublin, Ireland in 1980, we had accumulated the usual perishables, including a large collection of jazz records that were relatively inexpensive in Lesotho and South Africa.
We officially “still have” shipping boxes full of stuff in Dublin, Ireland. Records, photographs, books, clothes and our little daughter’s toys, all put in storage in June 1981, with the understanding that we would have them forwarded to us in Canada once we had the funds to pay for shipping them.
By the time we were able to pay the requisite fees, the storage businessman had exercised his right to pawn them off for a handsome return. I neither shed a tear for them nor do I remember the details of what we “lost.”
In the 38 years that we have lived in Canada, we have moved three times. Each move has entailed decanting stuff. Not once have I felt emotional about losing these things. The only emotion of loss has been associated with the separation from family and numerous friends and wonderful colleagues with whom we have shared our lives over the years.
I remember them with a fondness and longing that money cannot buy. The pain of losing those who have died along the journey endures, only eased by memories of great times shared.
All this is to say that it is the memories created at the home that we hand over to new owners tomorrow that I will keep. As for the building, it is now in my past. I praise God who blest us with that home. I praise Him even more for saving me from the burden of attachment to the house and its material contents.
As I write this, I am reminded of the inter-sibling conflicts that we witness with increasing frequency. The usual source of trouble is the struggle for inheritance of land and other property that those in the fight never even contributed to. People are willing to fight to the death over somebody else’s sweat and investments.
This is a symptom of dangerous materialism that blinds humanity to what matters. A sibling’s friendship, even his or her life, is subordinated to greed for perishable material possessions.
I see this in my villages of Mparo and Kahondo in Kigezi where neighbours, siblings, cousins, and descendants of a common ancestor are ready to kill each other because one has strayed a few centimetres into the other’s plot of land. We read reports of young men killing their parents over the latter’s refusal to hand over their land to offspring labouring under the curse of entitlement.
I also see this greed-fuelled conflict among the wealthy families whose patriarchs leave behind millions of dollars-worth of property. The greed cuts across both sexes and all socio-economic classes.
It is a materialism that is born of attachment to things that do not matter. It is a malignant affliction that has been amplified by the merchants of the prosperity religion who emphasise money and other material possessions as a path to freedom and redemption.
I encourage and applaud honest acquisition of wealth and material comforts and pleasures. However, I pray that we all continue to hold onto what really matters, and view the buildings in which we live, the cars in which we travel, the threads in which we are clothed and the money with which we pay for them as mere tools, not our masters.
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