To believe that time is the most valuable thing we have?

I agree with you 100%.
When my son was born in 1999 and then diagnosed with a life limiting disease with the life expectancy only being 32 at that time it changed my whole perspective on life.
Death has always been a topic in our house because it was gonna be a reality one day that we would have to bury our son so we sort of embraced death all while acknowledging just how shit it all is anyway I will get to my point lol unfortunately my son died in an accident aged 22 in May 2022 and of course it devastated me and his dad and his little sister but I felt a kind of peace because of his diagnosis there was never anything left unsaid and in a weird way that is only because of him having Cystic Fibrosis.
He asked me once if I would be livid if he died from something else rather than what was expected to kill him and I told him he better bloody not lol and he found that hilarious and everyone said after he died that it was just typical of him and how funny he would have found it (not that we think death is hilarious btw lol but as a family we used dark humour a lot especially my son) I can honestly say I treasured every minute with him because I knew it wouldn't last forever and I'm so so thankful for that and I wish everyone could approach life this way.
Since then I have lost my partner (feb 2024) and obviously that also devastated me but I know life is so short so I do appreciate every minute with every one I love (unless they are getting on my tits lol)
Sorry for the long unexpected reply haha I just wish that there was a better approach to death

Time, health and money are the 3 most important resources that most people have, and the importance of each will vary from person to person and across their lives.

Ask a 20yo which is the most important and they will probably say money, but ask them if they would swap with Warren Buffet and of course they say no, because time becomes more scarce/important when you’re in your 90s!

edited to remove typos and to agree with pp that relationships are vital for happiness

The obvious answer is that you want a reasonable amount of all the things you list. Having a large amount of any of them is meaningless, if you don't have a reasonable amount of the others.

There's no point having time if you don't also have money, relationships and good health. They're all interlinked. I've had periods in life where I've had an abundance of spare time but no friends or family to spend it with and I've been way more miserable than now, when I have a family and little spare time.

Time but even more so, love.
We hope for time,we live in time. But we absolutely live for love.
My neighbour lost two of her sons in the past few years. Time has been brutal, in many ways. I've watched time drag her through unfathomable grief and leave its teethmarks. But time also moves her away from acute grief back into that space where love gives her enough strength to persevere. Time moves on. Her face softens as she learns to transcend grief. Time has carried her. Love holds her.

Both time and love are blessings unmatched by anything else in life.

This. Time is hard with poor health.

The quality time you spent with loved ones (family &friends), is the most important thing in life.

We do need money in order to achieve this.

This is always trotted out on these threads, along with

the cliche about “No one on their deathbed ever wished they had worked more,” but it’s only partially true.

Of course working so much you never see your family is miserable but having loads of time and no money to do anything is probably worse.

I would rather work hard to provide enough surplus cash to do more than exist and have less but higher quality time with people I love, personally.

Time is indeed valuable but time stretching out endlessly with nothing to fill it is my personal hell.

I don't remember where I heard this, but it's always stuck with me: 'money comes and goes, but time just goes'.

Absolutely. And we need to appreciate that time every day. A very good friend of mine was diagnosed with terminal cancer on new years day. Totally out of the blue, 57yrs old. It’s made me realise I am wishing my life away, waiting for things to happen (eg DD become 18) so I can do things I have planned. I am going to appreciate every day, especially the days I get to spend with my wonderful friend as time is not on her side as its spread so much. Literally life has turned upside down with zero warning.

Appreciate good health, appreciate spending time with those you love and building memories. That could be a simple pleasure like binge watching some TV with your dogs curled up and a blanket on a cold January day.

I have been thinking a lot about this recently. Next week it will be 3 years since my sister died, she had turned 54 the week before. (It is her birthday today). She had an illness for a long time but even though she had been bed ridden for the last 6 months, I don't think I had expected her to die.
Her child, a teen at the time, will marry next year and has just announced that they will become a parent this year. These milestones would have meant the world to my sister .
You can buy so many things in this world but you cannot buy time.

OP you need to listen to the Craig Douglas song ‘Time’ - it’s a banger

It's all about what choices we have, or haven't.

We're all in the waiting room. Make the most of it.

I’ve been thinking a lot about this recently OP and it’s SO SO true

If you can nap or Mumsnet then you have time.

It's the lack of time for whatever you want to do with that's a problem.

Yes, I was just about to say exactly that.

My mum died of cancer.
When her cancer was terminal she said a bit of extra time was like winning the lottery.
12 yrs on I can still hear her saying those words.

I can’t agree. Of course it’s important, but I think time/money/health are 3 things that go hand in hand with each other. One, without the other, doesn’t give you the benefits of it. For example, you have lots of money and you are retired so have time, but your health is poor so you’re going to die in 8 weeks.
Or you have good health, lots of time as a stay at home parent to adult children but have no money, so you can’t feed yourself and your family efficiently, you can’t heat your home, so it makes life shit and everyone is living in extreme poverty, so time and health are masked by the diabolical situation.

Hopefully people get what I’m trying to put across. All 3 are important in good measure and for you to reap the full benefits of time/money or health, you also need the other two.

I think it's fairly privileged to say that time is the most valuable thing ~ it's assuming people already have a basic standard of living. People need to trade their time for money - often for minimum wage at £11 an hour - just to meet minimum needs of food and shelter.

I also don't see how they're comparable - what should we be doing with our time if not building success/relationships? I don't want to waste time doing anything else, those things are important to me!

I've been both cash rich/time poor and time rich/cash poor and tbh, there's pros and cons to both. You can have all the time in the world but if you can't afford to do anything with it it's hardly living your best life. Time is important, but so is enough money to enjoy it, and of course, good health.

Money + Time are almost completely equal. Having no money edges it. Life is dreadful with no money or no time

Health is very much a close second

I've had times in my life where I've had each in deficit (not at the same time) and having NO money is horrific. Literally starved. Had plenty of time to sit in a cold house being hungry with rat piss everywhere with no way out.

Having no time was a more recent thing and it made me have no sleep, anxiety, burn out. I felt on edge all the time.

Having poor health for a few years where I hurt all over and was really unwell was bad but thankfully I recovered.

I suspect though that people on this thread don't mean NO money. They still mean alleviated hunger and secure housing. So what they mean is sitting around their warm house with a nice home made soup reading books they got from the library

The privileged persons version of no money

Money helps you enjoy time rather than having to waste time worrying about how to pay the next bill.
A partner can fill your time with happiness rather than spend that time being lonely.
If you have your health it is easier to spend time on activities you like instead of spending all day sat at home wishing time away because you are in pain.
There isn't just one 'most important' thing in life, its lots of little things that can make or break you.

Yes, all these people earning £650k, and working 16 hours a day and literally seeing their kids for 30 minutes a day instead of hours and hours ...won't be able to buy that time back with all that money they earned...

I think time as a concept is actually harmful it stops people living in the now. They are looking at the past and future but not the present.

Good health is the most important thing, closely followed by time.

Nah.
Your health is your wealth.