Tao Te Ching, Verse 7, Part I

“Heaven and earth are long lasting (chiu).
The reason why heaven and earth are long lasting:
Because they do not live for self (pu tzu sheng).
Therefore they last long.
Thus the sage puts his body (shen) behind,
Yet his body is in front.
He regards his body as external,
Yet his body remains in existence (ts'un).
Is it not because he is selfless (wu szu),
That he can fulfill himself (ch'eng ch'i szu).” (Tao Te Ching, Verse 6, Ellen M. Chen Translation)

Christ and Lao Tzu both tell us that if we want fulfillment, peace, enlightenment, etc. we’ve got to stop looking for it in stuff and start following truth – why is it easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven? – b/c very few people get rich by accident and no one stays rich by accident – you’ve got to want to stay rich – you’ve got to care and focus and pay attention to your wealth – when you’re paying attention to your wealth, it’s impossible to pay attention to the truth – I thought about including that scene from fight club again, but maybe I’ll just touch on some of the key passages, no I want to include it:
JACK: There's always that. I don't know, it's just...when you buy furniture, you tell yourself: that's it, that's the last sofa I'm gonna need. No matter what else happens, I've got that sofa problem handled. I had it all. I had a stereo that was very decent, a wardrobe that was getting very respectable. I was so close to being complete.
TYLER: Shit, man, now it's all gone.
JACK: All gone.
TYLER: Do you know what a duvet it?
JACK: Comforter.
TYLER: It's a blanket, just a blanket. Now why guys like you and I know what a duvet is? Is this essential to our survival? In the hunter-gathered sense of the word? No. What are we then?
JACK: You know, consumers.
TYLER: Right. We're consumers. We're by-products of a lifestyle obsession. Murder, crime, poverty -- these things don't concern me. What concerns me is celebrity magazines, television with five hundred channels, some guy's name on my underwear. Rogaine, Viagra, Olestra.
JACK: Martha Stewart.
TYLER: Fuck Martha Stewart. Martha's polishing the brass of the Titanic. It's all going down, man! So fuck off, with your sofa units and your string green stripe patterns. I say never be complete. I say stop being perfect. I say let's evolve and let the chips fall where they may. But that's me, I could be wrong, maybe it's a terrible tragedy.
JACK: No, it's just stuff.
TYLER: Well, you did lose a lot of versatile solutions for a modern life.
JACK: Fuck, you're right. . . My insurance will probably cover it, so...
TYLER STARES AT HIM
JACK: What?
TYLER: The things you own, end up owning you. But do what you like, man. [FIGHT CLUB]

The reason why that movie strikes such a strong chord for so many of us isn’t so much because of the fighting – it’s because our spirits chafe under the burden of the consumerism of our materialistic culture – it rarely gives us what we want and never gives us what we need – what we need, what we’ve always needed is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control – everything else is just a distraction

I’ll leave you with a bit of wisdom from George Savile:
“Children and fools want everything, because they lack the wit to distinguish; there is no stronger evidence of a crazy understanding than the making too large a catalogue of things unnecessary.” (George Savile)