Let me begin with a trick question: What do you think is the most important word in this wise saying from Somerset Maugham?
Money is the sixth sense that allows you to enjoy the other five.
Did you like most people, say it was “enjoy”? Did you as a reaction to the whole sentence also think: “ah yes, that’s true!” If you have answered yes to both questions read on, and find out where you really stand!
And yet, how many times have we heard of people who had millions but were sleepless at nights? Who suffered mid-life crisis? Men and women who at the peak of their fame and achievements found it all to be empty and worthless? Yet, I am sure you are thinking, even I used to, “sure…there must be something wrong with them. Just give me a couple of millions and see what I do!”
Here then is a paradox: of itself money will not give you happiness…it is known that people manage to be happy with very much less than others think is basic necessities. Teenagers in Sweden commit suicide far more than those in Calcutta do…it cannot be having a higher standard of living. Money does not automatically teach the possessor of it values….and yet people are after the physical touch of money as if it is the ultimate joy itself. Why does this happen? What are the roots of this sort of thinking?
I would like to first of all define money. After that I will describe some of the realities in our society. Then I will offer some recommendations for what to do to not pay the high cost of wealth…because surely the maxim of Jesus Christ is true: What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his immortal soul? If getting the wealth is going to cast me more than it is worth, than I am involved in a losing bargain…the very thing that money-mindedness teaches me to avoid!
MONEY DESCRIBED
A businessman of Karachi Kazim Ali Merchant, 42, says in a local way: paisa tau haath ka mail hay (money is like the grit of the hand). There are many more ways of defining it. Carl Sandburg pts it well: Money is power, freedom, cushion, the root of all evil, the sum of blessings. And then there are the variations: R. L. Stevenson said: The lack of money is the root of all evil. John Rogers in his book LIFE 101 has a wise discussion on the actual meaning of the New Testament quotation: “The love of money is the root of all evil”. He says that the actual word translated as love from the Greek actually means lust and that makes a lot of sense: The lust for money is the root of all evil.
Money is a form of energy. It is the actual measure of our worth. It is the oil of envy, it is the comparison which makes for sleepless nights…just wait until you find out that someone whom you think is your equal makes a thousand more than you. The envy that grips you is so painful that the mind actually reels with bitterness and anger at the sheer injustice of the world. Money is an axis of desire: all that we want is at the other end of the hand that has money. It is the stuff of our dreams, our wildest plans fuelled by a commercialism and advertising that triggers in us the wishes that go on endlessly and the credit cards that allow us to do impulse buying and get us into a treadmill that grinds us and we wake up with children in the school and the club fees mounting and the shame of being a defaulter looming before our eyes…and then finally it hits us: how did I get here?
Sounds familiar? Is this your story? Do you now see why there is white collar crime? The poor fellow is so deeply caught in the mess that he/she thinks there is no option at all. Sadly, if you try to talk the person out of it, there are rationalizations available. (By the way, have you noticed: rationalize = rational lies). Does this fit your reading of the situation we are all in…some more some less?
And so I want to draw you attention to some ways of thinking about money and ask you to read the opening quotation: would you change the word? More on that below.
MONEY AND VIOLENCE
Many marriages are in great danger of breaking up because there is an endless feud over money. One common scenario is this: the husband makes sure the wife has nothing more than basic necessities: she makes sure that she buys absolutely useless stuff as a way of getting even with this attitude…which leads him to tighten the rein more which leads her to be even more wasteful….and thus a terrible spiral is underway. Psychologists offer an interesting insight into this: they say this is a way by which both are doing violence to each other and need to clarify what money means to them. Dr. Abida Khanum has a nice insight into this: “Money is a form of crystallized time. It is represents the hours of his life that he has spent working in exchange for which he has received this amount. As such it is his time-hours turned into a tangible form. By wasting it, she is making him know how she can hurt him…without lifting a finger. As you can see, unless this is openly discussed and the underlying causes addressed, the arguments over money will simply not end!”
The same logic must apply to those who take office supplies as a matter of right!
BUT WHY DO THEY DO THIS?
While we are talking about some realities in out culture, we are also asking about root causes. My studies have allowed me to come to a very unique conclusion. The source of our misgivings about money and this life-long insatiable desire to have more is most often located in the messages that we have internalized in childhood. Parents please note: discussing money before a child is eleven years old is a big mistake!
This is a generalization of course…but the point is simple: by talking about something a child doesn’t understand you are hardly helping him/her to grow up. Children do not know what time is when they are young…they need to be taught about it. In the same way they do not know that money is something that exists…they just see the things that are there and simply are for the taking. And when they go to a toy shop and demand something exorbitant, the parents (both mother and father!) feel that they have been cornered, ashamed, belittled in front of the entire community! Particularly the father switches into a mode where he feels that his entire manhood is challenged…what kind of cheapskate is this man, he seems to be hearing the unspoken taunt in the eyes of the other customers eyes, that he is denying this cute child a mere toy!
The brave parent who has a firmer grasp on the priorities (its not the cost of the toy that is the issue, of course, nor even the earning capacity of the father!) now makes a graver mistake: he says something to the effect: “are you nuts? I am not buying you yet another ______ costing Rs. ___________!” There! Just by mentioning the cost, the amount of money, to the little child less than 11, the parent has infected the child with a problem.
Mind you, I am not saying all this happens when the parents say such a thing only once: I am describing in slow motion a process that is repeated many times a week for years on end.
“But” you say, “I don’t get this! You have yourself said that the parent who has better priorities should NOT buy everything that the children demand (it’s not possible anyway!) and yet you are saying there is a mistake here…why is mentioning the cost an error? Isn’t it true? And how else will the children learn?”
That’s the problem. Young children will learn a highly charged NEGATIVE lesson: they will learn that: “of all the things that deprived me of the fun of living, it was this thing called money…so no matter what else I do in life, I will earn so much that I will never be deprived of anything else for the rest of my life!” And so it is that like a knot on heart, this reiteration of having no money keeps growing and you now have a person with a life long lust for more. The actual toy that was to be bought is forgotten…just this total all-consuming passion is left in the heart and you have a person for whom all talk of values, religion, nobility, greatness of soul….all sounding like rubbish….you have a person for whom the only measure of a man is his net worth. To see the bottom line as the net worth of a man is indeed a common practice. But to think the bottom line as the horizon…that is a sad decline of value itself.
By the way: what does one do when the child threatens to throw a tantrum in the shop? Here’s a suggestion: give any reason at all not to buy that thing EXCEPT the cost. Children are very easily distracted: say something like: “Aha! You want that Barbie doll! But darling it is in pink dress! And you like black dresses don’t you? So, as soon as it comes out in black dress, we will have it!” Now I know that is truly corny: but you’d be surprised how easily the attention is deflected. Of course, if the next shop you enter has one in black dress, you’d better buy it…just your luck!!!
And having now realized what a disaster it is, take a decision: do not talk about money to very young children. After 11, of course, teach them the value of time and how it translates into money. The penny will drop then.
SOME COMMON SENSE ADVICE
Mohammad Husain, 77, has this say: “Take advice on money matters only from the person who is not charging you for it!” Otherwise, no matter how sincere the banker is, he will get you to part with your money in his bank! Hence the worth of this article!
First of all, put something away from each payment you receive. In other words, live below your means. There is no reason for you to think that 90% of the money you receive isn’t enough for you manage. Remember: if you can’t afford something, maybe the lesson is to earn more…rather than spend more.
Second: understand that no amount of money is ever enough for you to be able to everything you want. It is always enough for your needs, though. See the crucial words: need…not wants.
Third: do this experiment. On a day when you are very thirsty, having walked in the sun for a while, and somehow dehydrated a little, take a good look at the cold glass of water in your hand. Feel its coldness. Now take a sip. Feel every drop of it cool your tongue, and feel the slow descent of cooling sensation all the way to your stomach. And now ask yourself: what amount of money in the universe is equal to that? I.e.: what amount of money would you be willing to pay for that?
Fourth: Observe that just being alive is a bonus. Nothing equals the sheer chanciness of being alive at all. So never miss a chance to make life better for others. Etsko Schuitema, a leading South African Management Consultant (recently in Pakistan) puts it like this: “Each moment we are going towards death. There is a world of difference in giving something of your own choice, willingly to someone you wish to give than have it taken away. So you have only one choice right now: either give what you have [knowledge, money, advice, skills] or be sure that they will be taken away. Make no mistake!”
Finally: a High Court Advocate Shoaib Ashraf, 47, says it well: Use money for a purpose better than money itself. That is to say: suppose that friendship is a value for you. Use your means to make your friendship deeper, ore cherished, more memorable. having a meal together in a nice place is a means of celebrating companionship…and good friends and good conversation are simply priceless.
If all this is good enough let me revert to my question I asked at the beginning of this article: What is the most important word in the quotation by Maugham?
My answer is “you”. If you haven’t taken the effort and the trouble to make something of yourself, if you are a bundle of impulses, crass bigotry, gaudy tastes, with no awareness of the world of the arts, good music, poetry and the best thinking of the world….then even with a million, you will be the same bundle of impulses, bigoted and tasteless.
Take money seriously by all means: but only because you take yourself more seriously.