Quotes About Possessions

There were few neighbors outside one's own small family or clan to pose threats. Because foragers tended to roam in search of food, personal possessions beyond a bare minimum became an encumbrance.

As a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights. Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions

The intuitive principle here is that we cannot be justified in owning what we do not need to use or plan to use. One does not earn money simply to store it away where it will be protected from all possible future use.

It is apparent to infinite players that wealth is not so much possessed as it is performed.

What is more yours than what always holds you back?

Idolatría! Amar tanto a los objetos puede acabar destruyéndote. Lo que ocurre es que si cuidas algo lo suficiente cobra vida propia. ¿Y no es ese el propósito de los objetos, de las cosas hermosas, ponerte en contacto con una belleza más grande?

our society was dominated by things, artefacts, possessions, machines, objects, and that we judged previous societies by artefacts—things. There was no way of knowing an ancient society's ideas except through the barrier of our own.

You can't take it with you, and even if you did, it would probably melt.

Arthur tried to hold her hand to steady her and reassure her, but she wouldn't let him. He held on to his airline hold-all with its tin of Greek olive oil, its towel, its crumpled postcards of Santorini and its other odds and ends. He steadied and reassured that instead.

Lists only spell out the things that can be taken away from us by moths and rust and thieves. If something is valuable, don't put it in a list. Don't even say the words.

The myths of the White City, the City of the Monkey God, a Casa Blanca or Kaha Kamasa, have a similar arc: There was once a great city in the mountains struck down by a series of catastrophes, after which the people decided the gods were angry and left, leaving behind their possessions. Thereafter it was shunned as a cursed place, forbidden, visiting death on those who dared enter.

THE MORE POSSESSIONS, the more worries" (Pirkei Avot 2:7). Do not think that your wealth and property will allow you to live happily and well. On the contrary—you will be caught up in taking care of them all year round. Any intelligent person can tell you that this is so, and any wealthy person can confirm it. —RABBEINU YONAH OF GERONDI (D. 1263)

WHEN SOMEONE SEES his neighbor acquiring some worldly property, whether some kind of food or clothing, or a house, or accumulating money, he works hard to get the same, because he thinks, "If my friend has this, I should also have it!" —ORCHOT TZADDIKIM (1540)

The truth is, our civilization is not Christian; it is a tragic compound of great ideal and fearful practice, of loving charity and fearful clutching of possessions.

I like to get rid of things; I don't collect many things. But I do keep great photography and art books.

I have four warehouses full of stuff. I have every boarding pass of every flight I've ever been on. I have all the old contracts that we had from all the clubs and concerts we played, every one of them, up from 1980. Guitar picks and amps - it goes on and on.

I think we could jam a bit more in our coffins than we do. I'm going to have some books, some I haven't finished or haven't read, some feathers and nice bits and pieces, the odd note. Just on the journey for the next bit.

In a consumer society, people wallow in things, fascinating, enjoyable things. If you define your value by the things you acquire and surround yourself with, being excluded is humiliating.

I threw away the whole of my working history, my photograph albums, diaries and stage clothes. Shoving big, ugly discs on walls is a bit like rubbing people's faces in it, saying 'I am considerably richer than you.' It is completely unnecessary.

People who wander are nicer to be with. Movement militates against hoarding possessions and against bigotry, because you are constantly moving across boundaries and having to negotiate with people.

I have everything, yet have nothing; and although I possess nothing, still of nothing am I in want.

We are … the un-proud non-possessors of objects whose chief substance is that of the transient symbol. Our Puritan fear of the love of things turns out to have been groundless after all, for we do not love things or even possess them: they pass through our lives as barium passes through the digestive tract, unassimilated, their function merely to flash signals along the way.

If we were to gain God's perspective, even for a moment, and were to look at the way we go through life accumulating and hoarding and displaying our things, we would have the same feelings of horror and pity that any sane person has when he views people in an asylum endlessly beating their heads against the wall.

If your trashcan or wheelbarrow has dent in it, you don't buy a new one. Maybe that's because we don't use trashcans and wheelbarrows to communicate our social status or identity to others.