“You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.”

Matthew 5:5

I love this version of Matthew 5:5 from the Beatitudes [which you can read here]. This collection of verses is jam-packed with reassurances and challenges to see the world the way God does. Turned on its head. And for me, it’s one of the best verses to hold tightly to when I’m having a rough day, or suffering from a bad case of FOMO.

I don’t know about you, but I have a real addiction to Instagram. In particular travel (or ‘wanderlust’ for those of you in the know), in which a good 89% of my day is spent living vicariously through other people’s adventures and explorations. For some of my closest friends it’s all about famous make-up artists and learning beauty hacks and tips to achieve the perfect contour or eyebrows, or stalking their favourite sports personality/actor/singer and pining after that kind of lifestyle.

There is so much on Instagram (and social media generally) that has us convinced we’re not really ‘living’ because we’re not going on 10 holidays a year; don’t have the cash to buy the latest make-up palette from MAC; don’t have the body of the person we idoloise or we don’t have whatever-the-latest-craze-is.

It’s exhausting.

It’s literally impossible to keep up.

And half the stuff we’re seeing is carefully curated for our viewing pleasure and not even close to being a truthful representation of a person’s actual life.

But we buy into it anyway.

Contentment in a world that tell us we don’t have what we need to make us happy is hard to come by.

And that’s why this verse is so important.

“You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.”

These words were spoken by Jesus two thousand years ago, yet they are just as relevant today. It seems us humans have always craved the stuff we don’t have. And the challenge in this verse still calls us to reorder our lives, our worlds and our scale of priorities.

When we begin to do that, our steps can get a little lighter, and we leave room to be thankful for all the amazing things in our lives.

There’s magic everywhere. On the dirt roads you’re tired of driving on, at the job you go to every day, at the school you’re bored of. It’s there in the people’s faces you take for granted – friends, colleagues, teachers, family. It’s always there. Open to any of us who dare to look a little longer and open our eyes to the world around us.