Money. More learning about money.

Years ago I learned to decouple my self esteem from my financial situation. I lost a lawsuit in which my bankruptcy-discharged student loans were un-discharged, along with 6 years worth of interest (the time the lawsuit took) and had essentially doubled. When I got this news I became suicidal, literally. I suddenly owed $32,000! I did have the wherewithall to observe myself during this experience and realized that I had to unhook my self esteem and my financial status. So I did.

My worth as a person has nothing to do with my material or financial status. I really get that.

Here we are years later (the outcome of the student loan situation is another story but suffice to say I believe the student loan business is highly unethical and at this point exists primarily to create huge masses of indentured servants in the US) and my relationship with money has continued to evolve. I now see money as essentially meaningless, a symbol to be used for the exchange of energy. I choose to live on a small amount of money, and to own a small amount of stuff. I like this much better than when I made thousands of money a week.

Now, however, I find myself working on another shift regarding money. I have been waiting for some funds which are coming my way. These funds are nearly here. In the meantime I have borrowed some small amounts from friends to get by. If I am going to drive then I need gas money. If I am going to eat then I need money for food. If I am going to hang out with a friend and get a cup of coffee, I need money for that. Now, I can survive without driving. Friends will feed me, and I don't need that cup of coffee at a café. However, having no money is inconvenient.

I noticed, when a friend loaned me some money so I could get a new windshield for my car, how my emotional state shifted. I felt more relaxed, more ebullient, with money in my pocket. That's not surprising, but when I stop to really think about it, it's screwed up. Why should having money in my pocket effect my emotional state? Why should my day suddenly seem to be going better when there is money in my pocket? How completely weird is that?

So now I am working on decoupling my emotional state from my financial status. I'll let you know how it goes!

Please read the article Fort Worth Police Chief: That Faggot Had It Coming and then please write a letter to the mayor and/or city council of Fort Worth.

The image is the circus performer twirling plates on sticks, except in the circus those plates are sometimes attached to the sticks and their precarious balance is an illusion.

Sometimes, though, the plates are really being balanced on the ends of the sticks.

Do you ever feel like you're watching a bad movie about the collapse of civilization, while doing your best to hold visions of viability and creative possibility? There is so much about the governing corporate bodies that essentially rule the world that is corrupt. We can see that their game is rigged. The plates are attached to the sticks. There is no balance, no real brilliance, just illusion.

Outside of the circus ring, however, real people are balancing plates on sticks everyday. We all know places where we are pulling off the challenging, maybe even the seemingly impossible. We know others doing the same.

The possibility for continued human viability, for a while anyway, lies in our resilience and our ability to do the seemingly impossible, or even just the very difficult.

Yesterday both before and after the radio show I experienced such a feeling of well-being. One of my key practices is awareness; holding many disparate, similar, geographically and through time realities simultaneously. As I get older my capacity for holding this awareness, or residing within it, grows. The value, as I see it, is that I continue to gradually see more of the hologram that is this universe. I see more the micro/macro patterns more dispassionately, and with greater appreciation for them. Maybe it was the combination of solstice and new moon, and the rain storms that were passing through the region all day. Good stuff.

The latest edition of Paradigms is now archived and ready for downloading. More good stuff!