What inanimate object can determine your life decisions, your attitude to yourself and how you relate to others? What object can evoke, fear, worry and a sense of feeling controlled?
Answer: Money.
If you think about it most of our life's decisions are based on the Money concept. Can we do this or that because we have the money? Do we have a enough money to buy the house, the clothes, pay the bills or the buy the car? The unfortunate truth is the money concept carries a value and that value merges with your 'self.' Money correlates to freedom and experience. Consider this - what if money were shells. Would you care how many shells were sitting in a pile? Would you work yourself to the extreme to accumulate a shell? Would you desperately need to show off your shells to others? When you shift the object of value then you realise how ridiculous the illusion is that we have been persuaded with. Yes money makes the world go round but that is because we believe that is so.
With the above in mind: If money is how you value yourself then how can you value yourself more without money as the gauge? How can you demonstrate your true value to yourself? What makes you feel rich inside? Well these are some questions that have crossed my mind since writing Money Farm and having it turned into an audio book by the brilliant Helen Lloyd. The thing that I have realised is that so many people often feel that their intrinsic value is directly proportionate to how much money is sitting in their bank account. Those that are in debt often experience a sense of financial shame. They feel worthless because they are stuck in financial ruts that they can see no way out of. When I was researching the debt figures related to Money Farm I heard the expression 'Nillionaire' - someone who has little or no money. That expression, albeit amusing, made me think of how many Nillionaires there are in the world. Can you imagine someone saying that person over there is a Nillionaire? How many would be proud of that title instead the tar of shame would be coated upon them.
Whilst writing Money Farm I looked at other systems of exchange and it dawned on me, in times gone past, when we had to eat we went out to hunt. We caught food and ate it - we cut out the 'money' as a middle man. When we needed other forms of food we traded. Values were applied to grain, cloth and other goods. I wondered how the world would exist without actual money and looked at alternative spheres of exchange and how values were applied. It was all so fascinating yet the truth is culture and civilisation need an exchange mechanism. We can't all take to the forests and hunt or forage. The truth is we need that exchange concept, although that exchange mechanism does not need to be intrinsic to the person. Money is not the extension of self, instead, it is simply a tool that can be invested, accumulated or spent. Once emotion and attachment is removed from the financial equation then there is a sense of liberation. Once you stop being your money and your money stops being you then that is where the fun begins. I am not saying stop earning money, what I am saying is that you are more than your money. You are a phenomenal person existing in time and space. I am sure that if you asked your soul what you were worth then it would not determine it in terms of money.
With that in mind, I will ask the question: how you can you value yourself without having money as a device for your self value? How can you demonstrate your own vast value to yourself without applying the concept of money? Finally how can you feel rich inside so that is shines into the world?
Enjoy:)
