“what is the most valuable thing you own”?

I journal on my phone in an app called Day One.  I like this app for a bunch of different reasons, but one neat thing they have is a daily prompt.  A question each day to answer in your journal.  

The one a couple days ago was “what is the most valuable thing you own?” and, as it’s supposed to, it got me thinking.  What defines value?  Who defines value?  Who do we *let* define value in our lives? My answer to the prompt was easy, no hesitation.  My cat.  

I think we all, myself included, fall into letting other people determine what’s most important, how to be successful, what the “key” to happiness is.  And that’s just going to result in some unhappy people when they realize there is no one-size-fits-all for happiness.  We are all responsible for figuring out what that means in our own lives and working toward it.  

I recently came to the realization that I am not yet interested in buying a house.  This realization came after I asked myself whether I wanted to buy a house because I actually wanted a house or if I wanted to buy a house because that’s what you’re supposed to do as a part of being an adult. Spoiler: it was the latter.  Just as I am perfectly content being on my own, I am also perfectly content in my apartment.  And maybe that will change at some point.  Maybe it won’t.  But I’m not any less successful, not any less of an adult, and definitely not any less happy because I rent instead of own.  

Another way of thinking about this question comes from the movie Leap Year (a wonderful Amy Adams rom com, if you haven’t seen it I definitely recommend you do).  The question posed was “if your house was on fire and you only had 60 seconds, what would you grab?”.  Later in the movie her character says “When my 60 seconds came around, I realized I had everything I ever wanted but nothing I really needed”. 

so what would you grab?

-adaline :)