Letting Money Off
The Hook
Money is neither my god nor
my devil. It is a form of energy that tends
to make us more of who we already are, whether
it's greedy or loving.
Dan Millman
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Do you love money? Can you think
of any question that is more loaded down with baggage
than this one? Surely you have heard that the Bible
claims that “the love of money is the root of all
evil.” Maybe you conjure up an image of the miserable
miser, Silas Marner, sitting alone and counting his
money. Maybe you think of the rich as selfish, greedy,
and dishonest. With these ideas and images associated
with money, why would you want to be one of the evil,
greedy, and dishonest rich?
Maybe you sidestep the question
by claiming that you don’t love money, but you love
what money can buy. Somehow, it seems much more acceptable
to say out loud that you love your house, your car,
and hundreds of other possessions that you bought
with money than to claim that you love money itself.
I’d like to make a case that
one of the reasons many of us struggle with money
is precisely because we treat money as an intelligence
that controls our lives rather than a tool we can
use to create abundant lives.
For too long, money has received
a bum rap. Money gets blamed for all sorts of harm
in the world. Money is identified with greed and abuse
of others. Money doesn’t deserve this reputation.
Many “good” people have learned
to give money a character: It is evil, it is filthy,
it is dirty, it corrupts. Some religious traditions
have taught us to separate money from spirituality,
to place money on the side of evil, to make money
the enemy. The net effect is that “good” people often
feel tainted by “bad” money.
At the same time, we all need
money to live in this world. So what do you do? Do
you claim to hate money but love what money can buy
for you? This conflict gives money too much power.
Money is a strange
thing. It ranks with love as our greatest source
of joy, and with death as our greatest source
of anxiety.
Joe Moore
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You can liberate yourself from
this conflict by recognizing that money is simply
an innocent tool of human intention. Money is not
a thinking being. Money has no intelligence. Money
has no mind. Money has no soul. Money cannot make
ethical decisions about how it is used. Money cannot
make you do anything contrary to your values. Money
is only a tool and you are the user of the tool. You
use money. Money does not use you.
Money has only the
power that we assign to it, and we have assigned
it immense power. We have given it almost final
authority. If we look only at behavior, it tells
us that we have made money more important than
we are, given it more meaning than human life.
Humans have done and will do terrible things
in the name of money. They have killed for it,
enslaved other people for it, and enslaved themselves
to joyless lives n the pursuit of it.
Lynne Twist
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Money is simply a tool, the way
a hammer is a tool. You can use a hammer to nail boards
together to make a bookcase. You can use the same
hammer to destroy a bookcase. If you destroy the bookcase,
don’t blame the hammer. It is simply a tool in your
hands.
This is really very good news.
If you have any lingering notions that somehow money
is going to ruin you, corrupt you, make you do “bad”
things, you can let money off the hook. Money is utterly
innocent. Money cannot turn you into a selfish, greedy
person, unless you are already selfish and greedy.
Money will never make you do anything if you don’t
choose to do it. And this is exactly the point. It
is up to you to decide how you will use money.
So why love money. Why not? Money
is a marvelous tool of abundance. With money you can
have material objects, experiences, and adventures.
If you are a loving, honest, caring person, you can
use money as a tool to do great good in the world.
The more money you have, the more good you can do.
For Your Abundant Success in 2007,
Kalinda Rose Stevenson
PS. As a special bonus, I have arranged for you to
receive A Free Report: “The Time Value of Money.”
If you are holding a real estate note, “The Time
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