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What does life mean to us, and what role does money play in our lives? Let's forget for the moment how to get it or keep it, and look instead at how it shapes who we are. We can see that chasing after money for its own sake is destructive to the soul (or to the person, if you prefer). But isn't it equally destructive to have such a powerful instrument in our hands while pretending it has no power or importance?
Is it important that our children eat? Is it important that they have access to education? Is it important that we have time to share the lessons of life with them? Is the time to explore our own spirituality important? Money can buy all these things.
Money affects every aspect of our lives, including the meaning of life itself. Yes, we sometimes over-rate the value of money. We surrender real values to chase it. But we also under-rate the importance of money in our lives. Name any valuable goal or direction in your life. Can't you, with a little imagination, see how money might help?
We can also see that the price of money, paid in time, compromising of morals, and additional stress, is sometimes too high. It isn't a question of how much is enough, or how much is too much. The more important issues are how we obtain it and how we use it.
Money is a serious subject. I hear friends say that money isn't important to them, but this isn't true. The truth is that they don't see the importance. They make more than they need and yet complain that they have no time for their children, when they could clearly trade time chasing money for time with their kids.
They pretend that they want self-improvement, but instead of buying the tools to help them (a book, a class, a trip to a monastery) they put $800 televisions on credit cards, taking even more time from their children and their own personal development.
It isn't about televisions. They are among the good things of this world. It is about priorities. How we make money and how we spend money reveals ourselves. Do we like what we see?
I wanted to raise the questions here, but if you want to read a great book on this subject, I recommend the book, Money and the Meaning of Life, by Jacob Needleman.