Are We Building Lives, or Just Bigger Houses?

Wafiq Imtiyaz

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For many families, particularly in Kashmir, a substantial part of a lifetime’s earnings revolves around three major ambitions—building a house, purchasing land and arranging weddings. These priorities are understandable because they are deeply connected to family, security, tradition and social standing. Yet when these pursuits consume decades of income, time and emotional energy, something important can get lost.

We are taught from an early age to work hard, save carefully and prepare for tomorrow. We are told that success means owning a house, acquiring land, raising well-educated children and being able to celebrate important occasions with dignity. These are sensible ambitions. A secure home provides stability, property can offer financial protection, and a good wedding can mark an important beginning in a family’s life.

There is nothing inherently wrong with any of these aspirations.

But perhaps we need to ask ourselves a more uncomfortable question: When did preparing for life become a substitute for actually living it?

For many families, particularly in Kashmir, a substantial part of a lifetime’s earnings revolves around three major ambitions—building a house, purchasing land and arranging weddings. These priorities are understandable because they are deeply connected to family, security, tradition and social standing. Yet when these pursuits consume decades of income, time and emotional energy, something important can get lost.

We may end up spending so much of our lives constructing the conditions for happiness that we have very little time left to experience happiness itself.

The house we spend our lives building

A house is not merely a structure. It is where children grow up, where families gather, where festivals are celebrated and where countless ordinary moments become memories. For most people, owning a home is one of life’s most meaningful achievements.

Yet the house has increasingly become more than a home. In many cases, it has become a measure of social success.

One family builds a large house, another feels compelled to build something larger. A simple requirement of space gradually turns into a desire for additional rooms, expensive fittings, elaborate interiors, imposing facades and larger plots. What begins as a search for shelter can become a lifelong financial project.

There is nothing wrong with wanting a comfortable and attractive home. The problem begins when the pursuit of the perfect house demands the best years of our lives.

A person may spend their twenties and thirties saving, their forties expanding or renovating, and their fifties still worrying about construction, loans or property. By the time everything is finally completed, the children may have grown up, parents may have aged, and opportunities to travel or spend meaningful time together may have quietly disappeared.

We work hard to create a beautiful place in which to live.

But perhaps we should occasionally ask: Are we also creating a beautiful life outside those four walls?

A house is meant to serve life. Life should not become an endless exercise in serving the house.

When celebration becomes competition

The same tension can be seen in weddings.

Marriage is one of life’s most important occasions. In Kashmir, weddings are also deeply connected with hospitality, family relationships and cultural traditions. The elaborate preparation, the gathering of relatives and the serving of Wazwan all have a cultural and emotional significance that cannot simply be reduced to financial calculations.

The problem is not celebration.

The problem is competition disguised as celebration.

Guest lists become larger. Functions multiply. Decorations become increasingly elaborate. Food arrangements become more expensive. Families sometimes feel that a wedding must match or exceed what others have organised before them.

Social media has added another layer to this pressure. Weddings are no longer experienced only by those who attend them. They are displayed, compared and remembered through photographs and videos circulated widely. The result can be a subtle but powerful pressure to demonstrate status.

For families with substantial resources, such expenditure may be manageable. For others, it can mean borrowing money, exhausting savings or sacrificing other priorities.

A celebration that lasts a few days can therefore create financial consequences that continue for years.

This raises an important question: Should the beginning of a marriage place a family under an economic burden that outlives the wedding itself?

Tradition deserves preservation, but tradition should not become an excuse for financial excess. Wazwan should remain a celebration of Kashmiri hospitality, not a test of how much a family can afford to spend.

A wedding should mark the beginning of a new life together—not the beginning of years of financial anxiety.

The property we accumulate

Land occupies a particularly important place in Kashmiri society. Property is security. It can provide a future for children, protect families against uncertainty and represent generations of hard work.

But there is a point at which security can turn into accumulation for its own sake.

We can spend years searching for the right plot, worrying about location, access, surroundings, price and future appreciation. Once one property is acquired, the next opportunity can become tempting. The logic is understandable: land is limited, prices may rise and ownership offers a sense of permanence.

Yet there is an irony in constantly acquiring pieces of the world while having so little time to experience the world itself.

Kashmir is blessed with landscapes that people travel thousands of kilometres to see. Mountains, lakes, forests, meadows, rivers and villages surround us. Places that are extraordinary to visitors can become invisible to those who live nearby.

We may know the market value of a piece of land but not the beauty of a valley a few hours away.

We may spend weekends discussing property but rarely spend a day walking with our children.

We may dream of building the perfect holiday home without ever taking the family on a simple holiday.

There is nothing wrong with owning land. But ownership is only one form of wealth. Experience is another.

What exactly are we saving for?

Saving is a virtue. Financial discipline is essential. Families must prepare for emergencies, healthcare, education, retirement and other uncertainties. No responsible argument should encourage people to spend recklessly in the name of “living in the present.”

The issue is not saving.

It is postponing life indefinitely.

There is always another financial milestone. First, we need to build the house. Then we need to furnish it. Then we need another piece of land. Then there is a child’s education. Then a wedding. Then perhaps another construction project. There is always a reason to say, “We will travel later,” “We will spend time together later,” or “We will enjoy ourselves once this is finished.”

But what if the list never ends?

The future is important, but it is never guaranteed to arrive in the precise form we imagine.

That does not mean abandoning financial responsibility. It means recognising that a balanced life can accommodate both security and experience.

A family can save for a house and still take a modest trip.

Parents can invest in their children’s education and still spend an afternoon exploring somewhere new with them.

A person can build a retirement fund while occasionally using some money to create memories.

The goal is not extravagance. Often, the most memorable experiences require very little money at all.

A walk beside a stream, a picnic in a meadow, a drive through a new part of the Valley, a conversation without mobile phones, or an evening spent with ageing parents can be more valuable than many expensive purchases.

Kashmir is more than the walls we build

Kashmir’s natural and cultural heritage is often described in grand terms. We speak proudly of its mountains, lakes, gardens, crafts, food, villages and traditions. Tourism campaigns invite visitors to experience the Valley’s beauty.

But perhaps those who live here need to rediscover it too.

There is a strange possibility that we can become tourists in our own homeland—watching visitors admire places that we ourselves rarely visit.

Our mountains should not exist merely as scenery outside a hotel window. Our lakes should not be places we visit only when relatives from outside Kashmir arrive. Our villages should not be spaces we pass through on the way to somewhere else.

The landscape around us is an inheritance.

And an inheritance is not only something to own. It is something to experience, understand and preserve.

Imagine if families deliberately created time every year to explore their own region. Imagine parents taking children to places they have never seen. Imagine young people discovering local history, traditional crafts, lesser-known villages and natural landscapes instead of believing that meaningful travel always requires going far away.

Such experiences would not merely provide entertainment. They could deepen our connection with the place we call home.

The quiet cost of always waiting

Perhaps the greatest danger in our pursuit of material security is not the money we spend. It is the time we cannot recover.

Money can be earned again. A house can be renovated. Land can be bought later. A wedding can be celebrated within different means.

But childhood does not return.

Parents do not remain young.

Friendships change.

Children grow up and leave home.

Health changes with age.

And opportunities that seemed available “next year” may eventually disappear.

This is why the question is not whether we should own things. Of course we should provide for ourselves and our families. The deeper question is whether our possessions are supporting our lives or quietly consuming them.

A bigger house is useful if it gives a family comfort.

It becomes problematic when building it means missing years of family life.

Land is valuable if it provides security.

It becomes less meaningful when accumulating it leaves us no time to experience the world.

A wedding is beautiful when it brings people together.

It loses something when social pressure turns it into a financial contest.

We do not have to choose between security and living

The answer is not to reject ambition or romanticise a life without material goals.

People need homes. Families need financial security. Children need education. Weddings matter. Property can be a legitimate investment. Saving for the future is responsible.

What we need is proportion.

Build the house—but know when enough is enough.

Buy the land—but do not let the pursuit of property become the only investment you make.

Celebrate the wedding—but do not measure its success by its cost.

Save for tomorrow—but reserve something for today.

Spend on experiences without turning experience itself into another form of consumerism.

Most importantly, recognise that a meaningful life is not necessarily an expensive one.

We sometimes confuse a higher standard of living with a richer life. The two are not always the same.

A larger home can provide more space without providing more happiness. A more expensive wedding can produce more photographs without producing more meaningful memories. More property can increase wealth without necessarily increasing the quality of life.

The things that matter most often cannot be measured in square feet, acres or rupees.

Build homes—but build memories too

Perhaps one day, when we look back at our lives, we will remember fewer details about the size of our rooms or the exact amount we spent on a wedding. We will remember people.

We will remember journeys.

We will remember conversations.

We will remember the laughter of our children, the company of our parents, the friends who stood beside us, the places we discovered and the ordinary days that unexpectedly became extraordinary.

The house will remain.

The land may remain.

The wedding photographs will remain.

But the years will have passed.

That is why the question before us is not whether we should build houses, buy land or celebrate weddings. We should. These are legitimate and often beautiful parts of life.

The question is whether we are allowing these things to become the whole definition of success.

A successful life cannot be measured only by the size of the house we leave behind, the amount of land we accumulate or the money spent on a celebration.

Perhaps success should also be measured by how much life we actually lived.

So let us build homes, but let us build memories too.

Let us save for the future, but leave something for the present.

Let us celebrate our traditions, but not allow social pressure to empty their meaning.

And let us remember that wealth is not only what we can own. Sometimes, the greatest wealth is having a life full of moments worth remembering.

Because at the end of the journey, the question may not be, “How big was the house we built?”

It may be much simpler:

“How fully did we live in it?”

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Author can be mailed at bandipora343@gmail.com