"Money is a good servant, bad master, (and a disastrous god)"

 The pursuit of 'money' is, in reality, merely the seeking of that which money represents.  Money itself is simply a concept, but because it can 'buy' other things we imbue it with a power that sometimes exceeds its actual worth. 

 At some point in our childhood we learn that money 'means' something.  We hear our parents talking about it, notice what it can bring into our lives, and so develop beliefs about its importance.  Yet this is not the way we are born.  We come into this world only wanting one thing:  Love.  We know our mother's embrace, recognize the warmth of attention and affection and notice the smiles of happiness on other's faces.  Love is very familiar to all children.

 Money is not.

 The pursuit of money is learned through observation.  We come to the conclusion that money can bring us safety and respect and power and all the things that act as surrogates for love.  Money seems to make people smile.  Money brings gifts.  Our parents appear happier when money is plentiful.  People respect (or fear) those with money.  So we come to the conclusion that money and love are intertwined.  

 And this is when we begin to relate to money in an unhealthy way.  We make money our 'god'.  We let it drive us, because we think that it will deliver us the love that we felt as an infant.  We buy ourselves things as an act of 'self love'.  We show others our possessions (obtained with money) so that we might feel respected.  We give money a power in our lives that it does not have.

 Money is a concept that can be used to accomplish goals, but it can never bring us the love or connection or respect that we seek.  When we make money our master or, worse, our God, we enter into an endless cycle of 'getting'...a cycle where what we seek always seems just over the horizon.  

 Ironically, the love we seek can never be 'gotten'...it is already inside each and every one of us.  The God we seek is within.  When we realize this it is easy to make money our servant rather than master.  Money becomes a way of navigating the world, a medium of communication that denotes an exchange of value, but nothing more.

 The next time you find yourself thinking about money, notice the role it plays in your life.  Do you associate it with love?  Do you find yourself 'needing it' in an unhealthy way?  Try to let go of your attachment to the numbers that represent your bank account.  If you can do this you will find, ironically, that money flows much more easily into your life when you are its master rather than servant!

 “Dr. Sergey Sorin’s Daily Message”  - The Transitional Thoughts for the day by Dr. Sergey Sorin are with collaboration from KC. Hildreth, an Industry Consultant. 

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