How we can keep ourselves in poverty and get out of it
Author: Ronald Engert
Money has been a cause of great suffering throughout human history. But viewed in an ideology-free way, it is an expression of appreciation. This article explores how money can be viewed positively and what mindset is necessary to achieve inner and outer prosperity. For this, the ideological veil must be lifted and the spiritual view of money must be regained.
Especially people who have a high ethical attitude and are committed in every way to the good in people, compassion, the environment, justice, non-violence and the like, often have financial problems. Why do people think there is a contradiction between ethics and money? Why do people believe that they cannot be good people and make money at the same time?
Fundamental beliefs that establish this contradiction pave the development of our Western culture. “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven” is one example. Such beliefs, especially when expressed in the context of a spiritual teaching, go deep into the heart. They shape our innermost ethical feeling. This sentence is from Jesus, and the innocent, pious person, faced with such a belief sentence, faces a dilemma. The dilemma that if he rejected this belief sentence, he would have to reject Jesus. Just devout, spiritual people who want to follow their hearts are kind-hearted people who see the good in everyone and are full of trust. But they have difficulty with criticism and rejection.
It is not easy to find a viable path through this mental tangle of right and wrong, good and bad, yes and no, approval and disapproval.
Abuse happens to just such valuable things like love and money. However, it makes no sense to punish love or money for being misused by rejecting them.
In relation to money, the general question would be, where and how can money be good? Money is actually an expression of love, because money is appreciation (more on that later). Of course, it is abused, just as all strong energies are abused. Insignificant, ineffective things do not have to take abuse because there is nothing to be gained from them.
SELF-WORTH AND INFERIORITY
The core problem with all these symptoms is actually a value problem. And here we are already in the middle of the financial sphere, where values are at stake. There is a very deep connection between the financial sphere and the spiritual sphere. You can see this already in the fact that many words find their use both in economics and in spirituality.
The sphere of economics directly derives from the inner dimension.
Just take such a word as credit, which exists in religion as a creed. A creditor gives the credit. The credo is the profession of faith in God. Latin credere means believe/trust. And indeed, trust is an elementary basic principle in the financial world as well as in the spiritual sphere. If you think the financial world through, you come across the concept of bank trust. Although every bank meticulously checks whether someone is solvent, in the end the factor of trust is irreducible and decisive for granting the loan. A long-standing relationship with the bank leads to bank trust and creditworthiness. In virtually every external sphere involving collective forms of intercourse, in business, contracts, jurisprudence, taxes, politics, we find the same.
The contract, for example, is a relationship of force, because it leads to force in the form of fines or imprisonment in case of non-compliance. Litigation concerning contracts shows that a contract, no matter how elaborate, does not protect against being broken. The contract should replace trust, but it does not succeed. Because the ultimate agreement rests on the honesty and truthfulness of the contracting parties. When a contracting party makes false statements or does not follow through on his promises, he betrays the trust of the other and betrays his own truth . The damage is not only to the deceived, but also to the perpetrator, who damages his own spiritual essence through this untruthfulness. This damage to one’s own spiritual essence is very consequential, because when someone denies his own inner truth, it causes a mental pain, leads to splitting off from oneself and then to self-rejection.
Many inferiority complexes result from this splitting off from oneself.
MONEY IS LOVE
Many people will outrage when they hear such a statement. Many conceive money as the cause of all the evil in the world: exploitation, objectification, corruption, wars, broken friendships and much more. The fact that money can cause such great harm shows, above all, what a powerful force it is.
Money, like love, is one of the strongest energies of all, because behind it lies appreciation. Appreciation is a spiritual principle.
If something is dear to us, it is because it has great meaning for us and because it can give us something that makes our soul happy.
I encountered a simple example just yesterday when a friend offered me a little kitten that had come to him and that he didn’t want to keep because he already has four cats. I was very excited and I agreed to take the little cat into my care. Then he explained to me what it means to have a cat, what you have to take care of, etc., and finally he said that there is a procedure that is common in the cat scene: the “tail money”.
This means that you don’t give the cat away for free, but that the new cat dad or cat mom pays an amount of about 50 €, on the one hand as an expense allowance for the previous cat provider, but on the other hand especially so that the new cat owner:in thinks about their decision again and really makes a serious decision to take over the animal and take care of it. Here a direct connection of money to love and care becomes clear. Is it worth the money for me to take this cat? As we know, friendship stops at money, because now it becomes serious.
It also means taking responsibility. The tail money shows this connection. It makes it clear to the person taking the cat that things are getting serious.
Money is a commitment, it creates connection.
Follow the link at the bottom of the page to read about how to balance your spiritual and financial spheres.
It is essential to recognize money as the spiritual energy that it is. All the criminals and oppressors of this world must not succeed in separating us living and loving human beings from this value. If we free ourselves from the ideologies that make money a means of oppression and alienation, and return money to its original meaning beyond illusion, we achieve a great leap towards freedom. Then money becomes a direct manifestation of our love and appreciation for each other and a means of caring, giving, connection and a comfortable state of being.
About the author
Ronald Engert, born 1961, studied German, Romance languages and literature, and philosophy, later Indology and religious studies at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt/M. In 1994, he co-founded the journal Tattva Viveka, and has been publisher and editor-in-chief since 1996. 2017 Bachelor’s degree in Cultural Studies at the Humboldt University of Berlin. Since then, master’s degree. Currently working on his master’s thesis on “Mysticism of Language”. Author of “Gut, dass es mich gibt. Diary of a Recovery” and “The Absolute Place. Philosophy of the Subject”.
Blog: www.ronaldengert.com
Journal: www.tattva.de
This article appeared originally on the German Homepage of Tattva Viveka: Heilung vom Unterverdienen
