RULE 103

People are more important than things

My grandmother always used to say this. I don’t know anyone who would disagree on the face of it, but she acted on it in a way that few people do. When my siblings and I were small, we would occasionally break things in her house, as small children do. My mother would get cross with us, probably out of guilt as much as anything, but my grandmother would ignore it completely saying, ‘It doesn’t matter darling. People are more important than things’.

I wish I was as calm and accepting as her about it, because I know she was right and, what’s more, I know she was happier for it. She really didn’t mind what got broken so long as it wasn’t us. She sailed through chipped cups and lost jewellery and torn clothes without a care – because they just didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.

Obviously we all know that lost and broken objects matter less than lost and broken people. But when the people are fine we just focus on the negative – the lost money, the dented car, the broken computer.

I used to get bogged down hugely with stuff. Just things. I owned lots of bits and trinkets and furniture and pictures and mementos and so on that I’d accumulated over the years. Along with a house to keep them all in, and a mortgage to keep the house. And I got as frustrated and irritated as anyone else when things got lost or damaged. Then I hit hard times.

I lost the house, then I gradually sold off almost everything I owned. By this time I was a single parent living in a rented house, with almost nothing to my name. But the kids got fed and, you know what, it was hugely liberating. It felt great not having to worry about all those things I used to own. I was free to concentrate on the things that really mattered – the kids, friends, people.

After a while I managed to turn things around, and over the years I regained what I used to have. A house, and things to go in it. But I’ve mostly managed to avoid regaining my old attitude to things. I’m more separated from my possessions now. If I get pleasure from them, that’s great. But I know that I don’t need them in order to be happy. That’s what people are for.