Many of us struggle with the idea that we don’t have enough
money to do or to have some of the things we would like, or
even to pay for the things we are already doing and having.
But just suppose for a moment you had the opposite problem.
Imagine having so much money that you realized you would
never find enough things to spend it on in your lifetime.
Spare a thought for seventy-five year old Warren Buffet,
second-richest man in the world, who faced exactly that
conundrum earlier this year. The poor (i.e. rich) chap had a
cool $30 billion to dispose of, and time was clearly running out.
Not only that, being the smart investor that he is, his fortune
continues to grow at a phenomenal rate, presumably in spite of
his best efforts to spend some of it.
The obvious solution of course is to simply give the money
away, but can you imagine how difficult that would be in
practical terms? Who are you going to give it to? Which cause
is more deserving than another? How can you ensure that it is
put to good use? How are you going to tell all those people who
would like some of your fortune that they can’t have any? And
how does all of that make you feel?
What quickly becomes clear is that when we deal with money,
which we all do on a daily basis, we are also required to deal
with something else. Responsibility. Fear. Guilt. Expectation.
Worthiness. Greed. Envy. And, strange as it may seem, we
have to face pretty much the same issues within ourselves
whether we are struggling with too much money or too little.
In my own work I have found that our relationship to money is
a reliable indicator of our inner state, and as we transform on
the inside, the flow of money in our life transforms as well.
The beliefs and emotions that have become associated with
money throughout a person’s life create what I call their
wealth-esteem. It is, of course, an aspect of self-
esteem that just happens to show up very clearly in how we
handle our financial affairs.
Some of us believe we have to work really hard doing
something we don’t really enjoy in order to pay our bills.
Others imagine that they would be happier if they won the
lottery. In the homeopathic field where I worked for many
years, a lot of practitioners love their work but are very
uncomfortable when it comes to getting paid for it, so they
burn themselves out giving away a great deal of their time and
expertise for free.
How we relate to money tells us a great deal about our values,
our sense of worthiness and the limitations we place on our
own freedom. Uncovering these unconscious patterns and
transforming them has a liberating and empowering effect on
our whole life.
So how did Warren Buffet manage to dispose of his billions
without losing too much sleep over it? With a single act - a
masterstroke - he solved his dilemma. Being the second richest
man in the world, it occured to him that there was only one
person better qualified than himself to handle that kind of a
sum. Enter Bill Gates, the richest man in the world, who, as co-
chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, now has Mr.
Buffet’s billions to get rid of as well as his own. Poor guy!
