Relative Wealth - Perspective
Good Day Everyone!
Wow, this is sure turning out to be a lovely summer! Everyday I'm getting some lovely tomato or eggplant out of my wee garden; and the temperatures are true summer temps. Lovely!
Recently I was in Ohio with my folks for 3 weeks. I grew up in Ohio and have always thought it was the very best place to have grown up. And lots of wonderful things still remain from my childhood memories. For one thing, no one fences in their backyards! This one thing makes for more open hearts, to be sure. People know their neighbors without fences.
I really enjoyed the grass. I know, but up here in the Mountains of San Diego we do not spare water on grass. This time of year everything is brown and dry; so I relished laying in the thick cool grass at night watching the fireflies and the stars.
Lying there I had some time to reflect and wonder about some things. For example, how can they build a beautiful 2800 sq.ft. home with the same size basement, have all the usual and more upgrades in flooring, mill work, cabinetry, landscaping etc. and charge $300,000 for it?
In other words, how come when I built my home in San Diego I paid $252,000 for a mere 1600 sq.ft. and did a whole lot of the work myself? I started to wonder about the myth (mindset) that we live here in California.
Today I ran across this article in the NY Times entitled Millionaires Who Don't Feel Rich (see link)http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/05/technology/05rich.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&th&adxnnl=0&emc=th&adxnnlx=1186419911-Cq1zcqpWUI0MA79SFlNWug
I read this article with interest. How can someone with a few million in the bank not feel rich? And then I started to put it together with my recent experience in Ohio. Lots of people there feel rich and have not the millions in the bank.
It's all a state of mind. It's all a mindset. It's all a set of beliefs. It's all relative.
One thing for sure, I certainly don't share the mindset of those in Menlo Park with millions who don't feel rich. I feel rich everyday. I have so much, life is so rich with beauty and love and place and people and thoughts....thoughts again. There it is, your perspective.
I remember when I was deciding to move to Ithaca, NY to go to Cornell. A dear friend from the beach here in San Diego asked me incredulously, "Why?" He couldn't see there was any life worth living east of I-5. That mindset, that belief system.
We are so free here on planet Earth we can choose to believe we are in prison. And so it seems some of the millionaire in the Silicon Valley have adopted a mindset of being in prison. A rich prison you might say, but nevertheless, it lacks....contentment.
Contentment is the greatest wealth. [The Urantia Book, p. 1447, par. 3]
If contentment is the greatest wealth according to the Urantia Book, then what is that? It is a feeling state within you. A feeling of ...WELL BEING, APPRECIATION, TRUST, SATIATION, SATISFACTION. Those feelings come from being able to fully be grateful for and deliciously savor and appreciate WHERE YOU ARE. It is knowing you HAVE, rather than feeling or thinking about "having not" present or future. Contento. I love the word in Spanish. Contento.
Within Contento is no fear. It is FULL.
Wherever we are in the economic game, there is always Contento. Certainly we dream of more, we are constantly desiring new things, new ideas, new creations, new situations...but they don't come unless we are Contento.
It makes me feel sad that someone with millions who has achieved so much already cannot relax and feel that appreciation and contentment whilst still reaching to create something else.
We are told in the Good Book to "Fear NOT". You already deserve the wealth and richness you have, and you deserve more - all that heaven offers - all of us, every single one.
Practice your Contento. Practice your "Fear NOT!" You Have. It's ok. It's all Good...God. Break free from the "collective" mindset there, here, wherever you are - and feel your Godchip saying, "I HAVE". You have because you ARE God here having a physical adventure. You already have it all.
Thanks for Reading! Kath
Wow, this is sure turning out to be a lovely summer! Everyday I'm getting some lovely tomato or eggplant out of my wee garden; and the temperatures are true summer temps. Lovely!
Recently I was in Ohio with my folks for 3 weeks. I grew up in Ohio and have always thought it was the very best place to have grown up. And lots of wonderful things still remain from my childhood memories. For one thing, no one fences in their backyards! This one thing makes for more open hearts, to be sure. People know their neighbors without fences.
I really enjoyed the grass. I know, but up here in the Mountains of San Diego we do not spare water on grass. This time of year everything is brown and dry; so I relished laying in the thick cool grass at night watching the fireflies and the stars.
Lying there I had some time to reflect and wonder about some things. For example, how can they build a beautiful 2800 sq.ft. home with the same size basement, have all the usual and more upgrades in flooring, mill work, cabinetry, landscaping etc. and charge $300,000 for it?
In other words, how come when I built my home in San Diego I paid $252,000 for a mere 1600 sq.ft. and did a whole lot of the work myself? I started to wonder about the myth (mindset) that we live here in California.
Today I ran across this article in the NY Times entitled Millionaires Who Don't Feel Rich (see link)http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/05/technology/05rich.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&th&adxnnl=0&emc=th&adxnnlx=1186419911-Cq1zcqpWUI0MA79SFlNWug
I read this article with interest. How can someone with a few million in the bank not feel rich? And then I started to put it together with my recent experience in Ohio. Lots of people there feel rich and have not the millions in the bank.
It's all a state of mind. It's all a mindset. It's all a set of beliefs. It's all relative.
One thing for sure, I certainly don't share the mindset of those in Menlo Park with millions who don't feel rich. I feel rich everyday. I have so much, life is so rich with beauty and love and place and people and thoughts....thoughts again. There it is, your perspective.
I remember when I was deciding to move to Ithaca, NY to go to Cornell. A dear friend from the beach here in San Diego asked me incredulously, "Why?" He couldn't see there was any life worth living east of I-5. That mindset, that belief system.
We are so free here on planet Earth we can choose to believe we are in prison. And so it seems some of the millionaire in the Silicon Valley have adopted a mindset of being in prison. A rich prison you might say, but nevertheless, it lacks....contentment.
Contentment is the greatest wealth. [The Urantia Book, p. 1447, par. 3]
If contentment is the greatest wealth according to the Urantia Book, then what is that? It is a feeling state within you. A feeling of ...WELL BEING, APPRECIATION, TRUST, SATIATION, SATISFACTION. Those feelings come from being able to fully be grateful for and deliciously savor and appreciate WHERE YOU ARE. It is knowing you HAVE, rather than feeling or thinking about "having not" present or future. Contento. I love the word in Spanish. Contento.
Within Contento is no fear. It is FULL.
Wherever we are in the economic game, there is always Contento. Certainly we dream of more, we are constantly desiring new things, new ideas, new creations, new situations...but they don't come unless we are Contento.
It makes me feel sad that someone with millions who has achieved so much already cannot relax and feel that appreciation and contentment whilst still reaching to create something else.
We are told in the Good Book to "Fear NOT". You already deserve the wealth and richness you have, and you deserve more - all that heaven offers - all of us, every single one.
Practice your Contento. Practice your "Fear NOT!" You Have. It's ok. It's all Good...God. Break free from the "collective" mindset there, here, wherever you are - and feel your Godchip saying, "I HAVE". You have because you ARE God here having a physical adventure. You already have it all.
Thanks for Reading! Kath
Labels: contentment, Contento, perspective, Silicon Valley, wealth
posted by Kath at
1:12 PM
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