Dr. John Price

It is rare for someone to react neutrally to the idea of wealth. Envy, anger, anxiety, scorn, superiority, inferiority are all in the spectrum of reactions. Resignation is another, perhaps the saddest. For many of us it seems that there is never quite enough money as we struggle to stretch our pay cheque from one week to the next.

Fortunately there is brighter side to our money tussles and trials—generosity and philanthropy. During 1998 each Australian donated on average $78 to the nation's non-profit organizations, up from $46 per person in 1988.

You can do an experiment for your self to see how seriously most people view money. Watch the change in people's speech and behaviour when they enter a bank. Better still, observe how you change. As soon as most people cross the threshold from the street to the bank, they become more reserved and respectful, particularly when they can see large amounts of cash. Researchers at Columbia University discovered that nowhere else, not even in church, did people behave more soberly.

Things get even more complicated and confused when we broaden the idea of wealth from the narrow boundaries of money and financial wealth. We can have spiritual wealth and emotional wealth. Also wealth in terms of health and environment. Another area is time. You could measure this one by a feeling of having all the time you wanted to do whatever took your fancy. There is such time poverty in modern society that the longest conversation between some husbands and wives is on a mobile telephone when one of them is in the supermarket checkout line.

There is such time poverty in modern society that some husbands and wives rarely get more than a few minutes at a time to talk to each other. Resorting to mobile phones, their communication proceeds by snatching a few moments here and there in supermarket checkout lines, ticket queues and traffic jams.

Why does wealth seem to elude some of us and not others? One reason is that most of us act as if we are allotted a fixed amount of wealth. If we have it in one area of our lives, then we cannot have it in another area. If we have it in money, we don't have it in terms of time or perhaps family relationships.

Or if we have it in creativity-a wealth of ideas-then we don't expect to have it in terms of money. Some of us, writers in particular, seem to get a high from our lack of money. It is a badge of honour that makes us feel martyred and self-righteous. Repelled by the consumerism of modern society, we are equally trapped by our own obsessive judgements.

And here is the big one: if we have spiritual wealth, then we certainly cannot have financial wealth. The primary focus of spirituality, we are told, is on the area of the soul, the area of life with such depth and universality that it transcends all relative values. When on this path we are encouraged to turn up our noses at the superficial trappings of our materialistic society.

Religions, recognising the ease with which we can become caught by a love of money, support this one-or-t'other view. In the Bible we read of "filthy lucre" (Timothy i.3) or "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God" (Matthew xix, 24).

No matter which side of the coin we are on-rich or poor, wealthy or living hand-to-mouth-most of us have an addiction to money. We spend a great part of our lives thinking about money, talking and reading about money, and performing actions that we do not enjoy for money. Putting it bluntly, money is seductive.

In short-term trading in the stock market much is made of the importance of having the right mental attitude towards money and success. Without this, it is said, it will always be a struggle and only a matter of time before you will loose all that you started with.

In the introduction to Market Wizards, Jack Schwager writes that on two occasions he was able to multiply $8,000 by more than tenfold but was not able to go much past that. It was his desire to understand the reasons for this that led him to write his book consisting of interviews with the top USA traders. He wanted to understand the keys to continued market success and he thought that the best way to do this was to talk to the top people in the field.

Even though his interviewees represented a large variation in strategies and approaches, one discussion stands out. "Win or lose," Ed Seykota said, "everybody gets what they want out of the market."

He continued, "I know one trader who seems to get in near the start of every substantial bull [upward] move and works his ten thousand dollars up to about a quarter of a million in a couple on months. Then he changes his personality and loses it all back again. This process repeats like clockwork."

Of course, for most of us, the idea of trading is as foreign as the far side of the moon. Even more so is the idea of starting with ten thousand dollars and converting it to a quarter of a million. Yet I see similar personality changes over and over again in the conservative world of secure, long-term investing.

For the past few years I have been giving workshops on the investing principles of Warren Buffett. In 1940 he started with $140,000 and now, through conservative, long-term investing, he is worth $35 billion. Buffett started with a partnership which he terminated in 1969. He then took control of Berkshire Hathaway as a vehicle for his investing. Amazingly, $10,000 invested in Buffett Partnership Ltd in 1956 and reinvested in the stock of Berkshire Hathaway at the partnership's termination would today be worth well over $200 million-after all taxes, fees and expenses.

Buffett's methods are founded in everyday commonsense. Find companies that have an economic moat around them, wait until they are selling at low prices as determined by the cash the company can generate over its life, and buy a substantial parcel with the intention of holding them for the long-term. "Forever," Buffett replies when asked for his favourite holding period.

To apply his methods requires a full understanding of each of the steps. The part that makes it easy, or should do so, is that each of the steps can be carefully described and laid out. Even so, it is curiously difficult for many people to follow them consistently.

In my workshops I detail Buffett's investing principles which people may prudently follow for years. Suddenly they blink and invest in some fly-by-night venture. In a few seconds all their careful analyses are thrown out of the window.

The reason for this is that to be truly wealthy we need wealth on all levels: financial, emotional and spiritual. Financial wealth without emotional wealth leaves us open to the seduction of money. It is too easy to be seduced into schemes that are on the edge of commonsense, let alone the edge of morality and legality, and then to slip over.

Emotional wealth without spiritual wealth is even more dangerous. People with this combination are just as open to the seduction of money, but now they have powerful emotional tools to make sure they get it. Understanding their own weaknesses, they have deep insights into the weaknesses of others which they can exploit in their relentless pursuit of money.

Without the balance of emotional and spiritual wealth, even if financial wealth is attained, it is a hollow victory since the hunger for more and more is not satisfied. It is no accident that drug addicts talk about drugs in terms of deals. While the addict is injecting one deal, he or she is anxiously considering all the ways to get the next one. Similarly, the money addict is not able to enjoy the success of a deal without fretting about how to set up one that is even bigger and better.

Fred J. is a business consultant who was never satisfied with any of his business successes. "Even as I signed up a consulting project, I immediately dismissed it as luck and would be searching for the next one," he said. "There was never any pleasure in the actual project from the initial consultation to the cheque at the end." Fred was suffering from the curse that was placed on Narcissus: "May he fall in love and not have what he loves." In Fred's case it was the love of the big deal, the one that was going to set him up for life financially.

In the wealth workshops taught by Sandy, my wife, and myself we describe thirty principles of wealth. In some cases the same principle applies on all levels even though the outer appearance may be quite different. This is like the principle of gravity-it is universally valid but appears to be quite different when applied to a satellite rather than the path of a cricket ball. In other cases, the principles only apply to a particular level.

In the remainder of the article I give a taste of some of the principles.

Universal principles of wealth

An example of a universal principle is that wealth is not a destination. It is a transformational journey through levels of spiritual, emotional and financial abundance. "It is the nature of life to grow, to be more and to do more," said Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Life is safe when there is growth.

Another example of a universal principle is the importance of honouring the source recognising that in doing this you are providing the nourishment for further creativity and abundance. A tree growing from a seed honours its source by creating a carpet of seeds. From within these new seeds more trees emerge. This fundamental dynamic of honouring the source along with its creative outcome is expressed by Lord Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita, "Curving back on myself, I create again and again" (ix.8).

Self-referral action is also a theme that runs through the books Conversations With God by Neale Walsch. One example in Book 1 is: "My divine purpose in dividing Me was to create sufficient parts of Me so that I could know Myself experientially." (p.25) Another is: "My purpose in creating you, My spiritual offspring, was for Me to know Myself as God." (p. 26) In these books we are more than being invited to participate in the curving back process, we are being told that we are essential for the actual fulfilment of the process.

How does this theme apply to the three levels of spiritual abundance, emotional abundance and financial abundance? Starting with the last level, we first see it applied in the act of donating money to support the social and physical environment in which we live: charitable and philanthropic gifts. Apart from the emotional satisfaction of making these gifts, there is often a financial reward. Many people report that, when they give money to causes that they believe in, even more money flows into their lives.

Paying taxes can be considered as a way of honouring the source of our financial well-being. When we pay taxes we can use it as a means of acknowledging the support obtained from the government and its various structures. In 1993 Berkshire Hathaway, the company run by Warren Buffett, paid US federal taxes of around $500 million. Commenting on this in the 1993 Berkshire annual report, Buffett said, "I have absolutely no complaint about these taxes. We work in a market-based economy that rewards our efforts far more bountifully than it does the efforts of others whose output is of equal or greater benefit to society. Taxation should, and does, partially redress this inequity. But we remain extraordinarily well treated." Last year Berkshire Hathaway taxes were well over $1 billion.

Turning to the emotional level, self-referral means spending time nourishing the emotional side of your life. Make sure you allow doing time on activities that you enjoy. Ask yourself what gives you pure joy. What makes your heart sing? So often we are scared to ask this simple question in case it leads to impossible dreams and ideas. We have struggled to find some equanimity in our lives so why risk disturbing it with pie-in-the-sky whims and daydreams?

When you put aside your fears and dare to ask this simple question, you may be pleasantly surprised. Often the outcome is a desire to do earthy things such as sit under a Morton Bay fig tree or walk barefoot in the froth at the edge of the ocean. Or perhaps splurge on a banana split. For others it may mean restarting the singing lessons that they had to give up when they started a family. Or paying regular visits to art galleries.

Nourishing the emotional component of your life also means acknowledging the gifts that you already have in terms of happiness, satisfaction and health.

The principle of self-referral on the spiritual level means closing the loop of experience at the deepest level of our existence. Prayers of gratitude are one way, keeping a journal in which you write letters of appreciation to God, or to Nature, or the Universe is another. Try meditation. There are now many organizations teaching wonderful forms of meditation that allow you to expand your consciousness while experiencing its source. Ask your heart to guide you to the one that is best for you. If you are still unsure, based on almost forty years personal experience and hundreds of independent research studies, I can report that I am very happy with the Transcendental Meditation technique.

As well as the universal principles of wealth, there are those principles that apply just to a single level. The most important principle that applies specifically to the financial level is to start a regular program of saving and investing. Calculations show that for every five or six years you delay in establishing an investing routine you have to double the amount you invest each year to reach the same financial goal at retirement. For example, $226 per year for 40 years at 10 percent annual interest results in $100,000. But to reach this same goal with five years of investing requires $16,380 per year, a figure that is beyond the reach of most people. You can see more examples in the following chart.

The chart shows the annual contribution at 10 percent per year that is
necessary to achieve a goal of $100,000 over each investment period.

On the emotional level a central principle is to locate and dissolve the mixed messages we have regarding wealth. On one hand we might say we want a higher income. On the other we sabotage ourselves with thoughts such as "rich people are mean" or "if I am rich, I won't know who are my true friends-do they like me for myself or my money?"

We see the ambivalence we have about money in many of our expressions. "Filthy rich" is one; it implies that money is dirty and unclean and so, by extension, poverty is pure and clean. Another expression "lousy with money" identifies having money with being covered in lice.

Sometimes in my investment workshops I talk about a wealth angel whose role is to give each person all the wealth he or she desires. The only requirement is that there must be no other personal beliefs or desires that contradict the desire. Because of our ambiguous attitudes towards money, few of us would have more than a fleeting visit from this angel. Within a few moments she would be well aware that although we might say we want the money for a new car, we push it away by complaining about the cost of insurance.

On the spiritual level of wealth, a central principle is to have regular meetings, preferably daily, with your Personal Financial Advisor or PFA. "Whoa," you are probably thinking. "I don't have any financial advisor. And if I did, I would not be able to afford daily meetings."

Fortunately, consultations with your PFA will not cost you a cent. By your PFA, I mean your soul, or your heart, or that quiet voice on the subtlest level of feeling. Whatever words you use to describe that gentle level of knowingness that is patiently waiting to give you precious advice.

No question is too small for your PFA and no problem is too big. Don't know how you are going to find the money to pay the telephone bill? Just ask. Can't decide between two multi-million dollar investments? Again, just ask.

It may take a little time to learn to hear your PFA. And still more time to learn to listen with trust and openness. But your patience will be rewarded over and over. As you progress, start to ask deeper questions. "Why do I always have difficulties finding money to pay the telephone bill?" Or, "What projects can I start that will do the maximum amount of good for myself and for my community?"

When you become familiar with your PFA and recognize its priceless gifts, then wealth can blossom in your life in all its varieties and on all levels: spiritual, emotional and financial.

The binding power of money has been recognized by religious and secular leaders from the time of Pythagoras who declared that luxury should be avoided adding that we all should accustom ourselves to living simply. Yet, the act of eschewing money can be just as binding as a committed search for more and more wealth. Frightened of falling prey to the power of money, we give it even more power over our decisions.

When we recognize our money addictions and conflicts, then we have taken a bold step to a level of preferences regarding money where we act upon it, rather than it acts upon us. Or, even better, we act in harmony with it recognizing that money, just like a person, responds to the way we think about it. "Nurture it, treat it well, and it will grow and flourish," writes Suze Orman in The Courage to be Rich. "Treat it carelessly, or with disrespect, and it will dwindle away to nothing."

By implementing the principles of wealth described above, we can move to a level where we have all the financial, emotional and spiritual wealth that we choose. At the same time, it is a level where we welcome the opportunity to use our wealth in the most evolutionary and positive way for our own good and the good of humanity. At this stage the journey of wealth is experienced as an expression of the universal journey that we are all on whether consciously or unconsciously, openly or secretly, and this is the journey of coming home. It is the journey of recognition that the quality of our lives does not depend upon how much we earn or accumulate, but on knowing who and what we are.

Orman, S. The Courage to be Rich, Riverhead, New York, 1999.
Schwager, J., Market Wizards: Interviews With Top Traders, Harper, New York, 1993.
Walsch, N., Conversations With God, Book 1, Putnam, New York, 1996.

This article appeared in Wellbeing, October, 2000.