Thoughts on divorce - 3rd installment

My most popular blog posts have been about divorce. So does that mean I should write about it more? Or less - you are just nosey and this shouldn't be encouraged? WHO KNOWS.

When I got divorced, I was driven by my sister into the sunshine (Cambridge) with a few bags in the boot of her car. I basically had the items I had left my university bedroom with a few years earlier, plus two wedding presents from university friends. While I was in an unhappy relationship, I cared about new windows, extensions, cars, paints. Once I left the relationship, a part of my materialism left me too. I cared about people, love, family. 

There is a mental freedom that arrives with freedom from belongings. There is less to worry about and less to restrict you. There are fewer hurdles in your path ahead. I guess this is why major faiths advocate it; over time we shackle ourselves to belongings again and again, and again and again we need a reminder to release ourselves, a rhythm of recalibration, a Sabbath, a Sabbatical, a Jubilee.  

I try and remind myself of this when spending time on Rightmove looking at spare bedrooms and gardens (in my view the biggest luxuries in London). Happiness is not to be found in spare bedrooms or architect's drawings. It's found in walking with the right people, down the right path and once a week, once every seven years, or 50, we need to force ourselves to remember.