I had a friend once who was horrified at my aim to continue to increase my net worth. The man, himself a self-made millionaire, has in more recent years turned to a so-called spititual path. When I explained my philosophy on making money his comment was something like “Oh well the financially wealthy people you know are certainly different to the ones that I know”. And some of them are and some of them aren’t. I just hope that I am different to what he had in mind.
As an ethicist, from an ethical perspective, there is nothing whatsoever wrong or immoral in becoming the (financially) richest person on the planet. IT ALL DEPENDS on HOW you make the money, HOW you spend that money, and HOW you treat other people at all levels.
I’ll write an article on this shortly, in which I explain the last paragraph.
Meanwhile, just a few points to consider.
1. The more money we are able to attract into our lives, by ethical means, then the more we are able to help those who are less fortunate. After all, if no one was wealthy, where would the money come to fund social service payments for the poor – if indeed you live in a lucky country like I do that funds social service needs.
2. We don’t have to be rich to make a difference to the world – but it sure can help
3. If we have been given gifts or talents that can be monetized, then it’s our spiritual duty to do so, again so that we can help others, and also act as an ethical role model. What a waste to be given talents and then not to develop them to our full potential.
4. To paraphrase Aristotle, in a very crass way too I must add. In his teachings on Justice and equity in The Nicomachean Ethics, he said that ‘equals must be treated equally, and unequals treated unequally’. And what he meant by that is that, in essence, if someone has worked very hard to develop their talents, then they deserve added comforts compared to someone who has just cruised along and perhaps even ’sponged’ off society.
5. So the financially wealthy person deserves whatever comforts that they need to support their continuation of adding value to society in the most ethical, and spiritual way possible.
However, a vulgar display of opulence, generally comes back to the person concerned having a major ego problem. And that is not at all spiritual.
It’s all about Learning to live a Loving Laughing life and in so doing, help create a loving laughing world.
