contentment by subtraction

So I have established that everyone is pretty much going to get a book review on Burroughs, 

"The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment". I am just learning so much from it and it makes so absolutely convicting points.

Such as:

 " A carnal heart knows no way to be contented but this: I have such and such possessions, and if I had this added to them, and the other comfort added that I have not now, then I should be contented. PErhaps I have lost my possessions, if only I could have something given to me to make up my loss, then I should be a contented man. But contentment does not come in that way, it does not come, I say, by adding to what you want, but by subtracting from your desires. It is all one to a Christian, whether I get up to what I would have, or get my desires down to what I have, either to attain what I do desire, or to bring down my desires to what I have already attained. My wealth is the same, for it is as fitting for me to bring my desire down to my circumstances, as it is to raise up my circumstances to my desires."

How often do we strive to gain contentment by trying at all cost to achieve our desires instead of realizing the need to simply lower those very desires to what we already have attainded. For the problem is not the lack of possessions or comfort, but the value placed on those possessions and comfort; and more so, quite frankly,  the skewed view of the word need. Oh to better and correctly define and use such a small word in my life. A feat to behold indeed. 

Be encouraged.