Bill is a professional low limit grinder. He goes by the name of DollarBill, or something like it, on most of the online sites and he earns the name. He only plays games with a blind of a dollar or two and has never tried to move up. On a good month, Bill makes three thousand dollars and he averages just about two thousand, which is just barely enough to meet his monthly nut and have a few dollars left over for himself.

Bill lives in one room of a group house in a small college town. He doesn’t own a car or any vehicle besides his old, beat-up red bicycle. He has no insurance, no wife or girlfriend, and no furniture besides his futon and his computer. He’s proud of the fact that he lives “off the grid” and takes care of himself without having to get a job. His worries and his cares are few.

One day Bill found a website that told him if he just typed in a wish it would come true. So, before he went to bed, he typed in his wish. “If I could only be a rich man, how happy I would be.”

When he woke up he was no longer in his futon in his old room. He was in a huge bed with soft sheets in a mansion. He had three different gaming systems, four big screen TV’s, three cars and a motorcycle. There was even a big swimming pool in his back yard. He couldn’t believe his good fortune and he was very happy with his new life.

One month later Bill was tired of all his new responsibilities. His pool needed to be cleaned every day, his cars needed gas and maintenance, there was always something that needed to be done or bills that needed to be paid. He spent so much of his time just caring for all his new things that he had little time to play.

Then he happened to see on TV a visiting king from a foreign nation was in town. He sighed at all the king’s servants and thought that the king must be the happiest man alive. It must be great to have everything done for you so that you could always do what you wanted to. He went back to the website and typed in a new wish, “If I could only be that king, how happy I would be.”

The next day he woke up in the presidential suite of the Hilton hotel. The room was the epitome of luxury. His clothes for the day had been laid out for him right down to his shoes. His breakfast was already on the table waiting for him. Even his toothbrush was already covered with toothpaste waiting for him to use it. “It’s good to be the king,” he thought. There was nothing to do but enjoy. Bill was extremely happy.

This time it only took a few weeks for Bill to become dissatisfied. From the moment he awoke in the morning until he lay down at night he barely had five minutes to himself. There were always decisions to be made, many of which were very important and he was constantly worried about doing the right thing. The pressure of it all was making his stomach and his head hurt and he took antacids every day.

Bill logged back into the website and thought about what he wanted. “I want to be free from worry and responsibility and be able to do what I want all day,” he typed.

When he woke up the next morning Bill was back in his room on his futon. He put on his old jeans and a tee shirt, ate a bowl of cereal, and logged onto some poker sites. He smiled as he played because he had realized that maybe things weren’t so bad just the way they were and he never logged back onto the wishing website again.

This modern day version of the ancient oriental fable about the stonecutter still makes a valid point. How many of us are like Bill – unable to appreciate what we have and always thinking that we need something else to be happy?

It is the rare person who is truly thankful for what he has. We all think we want what we don’t have. We think that more money, or more fame, or just more, is the key to happiness. In fact, happiness is a lot easier to achieve. All we have to do is simply allow ourselves to be happy with what we have. Whenever I start to think that I need something I don’t yet have to be happy I think of a man I met. He was old, and had only one leg. He didn’t see or hear so well and when I saw him he was alone in a hospital, with no friends or family by his side. He only said one thing, and he wasn’t even talking to me, just talking out loud to himself. He had the window shades open and was smiling at the setting sun with his few remaining teeth when he said, “It’s a beautiful day.”