Who owns whom? (Ruskin and Thoreau)

Many people worship money like a god. They sacrifice their health and their peace to chase it. Ruskin reminds us about the fantasy that sometimes goes on in our head when the question of "who owns whom" comes up?

"In a shipwreck, one of the passengers fastened a belt about him with one hundred pounds of gold in it, with which he was afterwards found at the bottom. Now, as he was sinking--had he the gold? Or had the gold him?"

Thoreau echoes this in Walden where he writes about how his neighbors get lost in never ending rituals and complexities.

"The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors have undertaken; for they were only twelve, and had an end; but I could never see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor. They had no friend Iolaus to burn with a hot iron the root of hydra's head, but as soon as one head is crushed, two spring up."

A good antidote to a sick complex life is that of voluntary simplicity as Thoreau also recommends. The question, that Voluntary Simplicity helps answer, is the question of what IS enough so we may be happy right now in the present. A life of Voluntary Simplicity focuses our attention on the fact that "everything we own take a little piece ~ peace of us." And in doing so, we can let go of peace and life destroying rituals and possessions and replace them with a contented, satisfied and complete life in the present moment instead of a life that revolves around the next thing to be acquired in hopes of satisfying our insatiable appetites. Greed is never satisfied by attainment - it is only satisfied by contentment.

The first step to a new life is that of gratitude for life itself here Thoreau puts no qualifiers on his peace. He is grateful just to be.

"I am grateful for what I am & have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. It is surprising how contended one can be with nothing definite - only a sense of existence."

Money? Money is a tool. Money is stored energy, but money only goes so far with giving a person a good life. Money is not bad or good ... it is people that do bad or good things with money. Sure, get some money, we all need it in society. But don't sell your health and your soul to get it by artificial means that are outside of your comfortable capacity to gain the money.

Take Care,