Time to appreciate the things you have

Do you really appreciate the things you have in life?

It is easy to take the simplest things for granted, like having a roof over your head and food to eat.

We as humans can never have enough, if you drive a Toyota you want a BMW, if you have a house in Randburg you want to live in Sandton – we always want more. And no amount of money will ever be enough.

The saddest thing is that when we have all these things and achieve our goals, we do not appreciate them. It is human nature to be ambitious and dream big, but the one thing we forget is to remember how far we have come and to truly be grateful. Sometimes you have to see how other people struggle, to bring you back down to earth.

For Mandela Day, my staff and I visited a crèche in Kya Sand Informal Settlement and handed over food. This was a real eye-opener for me to see how people battle to make ends meet and feed their children. The crèche operates out of three containers and caters for pre-school children.

It absolutely broke my heart to see the extreme poverty and to hear some of the gut-wrenching stories of how these children live. They do not have anything, yet each child was smiling and looked like they did not have a care in the world. My heart goes out to these little ones, because I know that without initiatives like these they’d probably not get anything to eat for the entire day.

If these children can be happy with the little they have, what can justify us complaining while we have so much to be grateful for? This is the question I asked myself and I actually felt ashamed when I realised what a spoiled brat I am, to even think of complaining about what I have.

So I challenge you to think about all the blessings you have and remember to be thankful rather than complain.