I was thinking this morning.... Last week, I was decluttering my wardrobe when I saw this lace kaftan or what we used to call buba and shokoto. I had made that outfit for the dedication of my first child and had been reluctant over the years to give it away because it always reminds me of the joy of that special day. The value of that piece of clothing to me is not in the cost but the memories associated with it. To someone else, it is a piece of relic.
Some years ago, when my son was in his early teens and about my height, I decided to give him a shirt I really loved. I thought it would look good on him. My boy wore it once and never again touched it. After many months, I noticed the shirt was buried in his wardrobe. As I took it out, I wondered how a piece of clothing I value so much meant nothing to him. It was then I appreciated the relativity of value.
To my son, the shirt was old school and not his type of clothing. T-shirt was his thing at the time. However, to me, apart from the shirt being expensive, I looked and felt good in it. While the shirt was valuable to me, it meant nothing to my son. My value, his nothing.
Something that means the world to one person can mean absolutely nothing to another person. You see a man treat his wife condescendingly. He insults her, beats her up, and handles her like rag. Yet another man adores that same woman, worships the floor she walks on and praying for a chance to be with her and love her. What is nothing to the husband, is of value to another man.
Value is relative. Some things may not have monetary value, yet they are priceless. Some things become priceless because of what they represent to some persons. What's valuable to me is not up to you to decide. Just like what's valuable to you has nothing to do with me. The Eiffel Tower in Paris looks like a pile of metals to me, but because it is valuable to the French, it has become valuable to the world.
Believe in what you value, and others will come to respect it as well. Respect what I value just like I will respect yours. It's okay if we disagree on what material things we value, but one thing we should never disagree on is valuing a soul. Every life is more valuable than gold. Job 28:16.
Stay hopeful. God's got our back.
Happy Sunday!
......Just the thoughts of a certain Wey Mey