The Money Shaman is Useless with Money!

What has been your history with handling money?

What’s shaped your relationship with money?

Here’s my story about how I was useless with money – you may relate to some of the things I am about the share.

About a week before I was due to take my ‘A’ Levels at school (quite a while back now) I had a surprise visit from the ‘Careers Master’. He was concerned that he had never once seen me in one of his lessons (I use the term “lesson” generously).

Scarey, but he was the ‘custodian’ of this mystical thing called ‘our future’.

He was a dark, stumpy man with a permanent scowl etched into his wide face. It always seemed to me that something had sucked all the joy out of him at some point and he hadn’t yet noticed. Moreover it seemed a strange choice to have someone of his nature as the ‘custodian’ of this mystical thing called ‘our future’.

He had made the ‘Mother’ of all choices.

It appeared that he had made the ‘Mother’ of all choices with regard to his own future. There was no trace of inspiration or wonder emanating from his days at work.

Looking me square in the eye, “De Angolus, it’s come to my attention that we need to have words,” he said in the kind of tone that didn’t have any other option built in.

“It’s De Angelis, Sir,” I said.

Ignoring my correction, he started to lecture me on the importance of planning for a proper job. Apparently it had somehow come to his attention that I was applying for Art College and he wasn’t at all happy (and by his bench-mark of happiness this was very grim).

In fact, not only was he not happy, my form master wasn’t happy (who, incidentally, was a hunched, wafer-thin and largely joyless being) and the Head Master wasn’t happy (a kind of resigned, lost being).

Even my Art Master wasn’t happy!

The rub was this: The school wanted it’s A Level students to get this strange thing called a proper job – a job that paid ‘good’ money and had a ‘future’.

I can assure you that this wish of the school was NOT out of love for their pupils. Generally speaking they did not have a wish that all who passed through their gates would be happy and live wild, fully alive lives

No, it was something far more basic: Statistics.

Specifically, statistics which reflected students getting jobs and going into full time employment. Or students going on to further education in a suitable subject that would of course lead to good ‘prospects’, leading to a full time job.

An application and possible entry into Art College didn’t wax well in terms of statistics. In my Headmaster’s words, artists were suicidal lushes, impoverished homosexuals or miserable spongers. These were they days before political correctness of course.

A strong instinct that this whole bunch of ‘rules’ was basically bull.

The subsequent conversation (I use the term loosely) that ensued between the Careers Master and me was both unremarkable and at the same time pivotal.

You see, even though prior to this unremarkable meeting I had a strong instinct that this whole bunch of ‘rules’ was basically bull.

On that day I was gifted a clear, beautiful and illuminating message:

“Don’t do anything that kills your inner sense of wonder and inspiration!”

Call this a message from the vast stillness, or simply a crescendo caused by an accumulation of observations of those who had either ignored or never received such a communication. Whatever, it downloaded into me like a bolt of lightning.

I knew with every ounce of my being that I would fall sick if I ignored this message. I’ve tested this theory and yes it is true… my friends and wife in particular will testify to it.

How does all this relate to being useless with money?

So getting to the point…. How does all this relate to being useless with money?

Well I must confess the title of this post is a little misleading. In fact I would say that I’m useless with money in a ‘Conventional’ way.

Basically that strong instinct never to do things that killed my spirit, so to speak, meant that it was impossible for me to look at money in a conventional way.

In other words I was gifted with NO CHOICE in the matter if I wanted to stay healthy and vital.

Freedom is never having to choose.

The Taoists said that in fact freedom is never having to choose, and I get this on a deep level even though it runs totally counter to our entire culture.

As I saw my school friends getting jobs and some of them becoming very adept at earning money, I noticed my intense lack of interest in ‘money’ for the sake of accumulating ‘things’.

For me, money was only good for one thing: enriching the experience of being alive… period! In my case this involved less ‘things’ and more experiences.

Without it being endowed with the ability to enrich our spirit, I saw money as a dead force – an impotence. And really if you look at it, the way money is used and the way we are taught to earn money is largely in service of this joyless dead force.

Throughout my adult life, I’ve been what can only be described in conventional terms as reckless, stupid, clumsy and downright useless with money.

I’ve walked away from ideas that had the potential to earn millions because I stopped believing in them.

And I’ve spent a small fortune on investigating the question ‘Who am I?’ I found no answers worth holding on to but the journey has been miraculous.

I’ve had lots of money come and go and I’ve also experienced scraping along on benefits at the lowest points (from a conventional viewpoint).

Funny… I met some of the sweetest and most generous people in the dole queue! Perhaps because I was looking out for them.

My life has fallen apart, come unravelled, so many times I’ve lost count.

And yet it has always woven itself back together into an even more exquisite tapestry. I’ve no idea how this happens. I’ve just learnt to let go of things having to be a certain way.

I’ve stopped trying to change people and instead know that whatever I may see wrong with them is only ever about what’s going on inside me.

I’ve come to a point of peace with the fact that I will go to my grave carrying most of the neuroses that I’ve spent a large portion of my adult life trying to get rid of.

In other words it’s not my business to get rid of them or keep them: I’m powerless and paradoxically in this, I feel the flow of power streaming through my mind and body.

But all the way through, I’ve used money to enrich this strange, beautiful and sometimes difficult thing we call life.

Money can be used for amazing things…. ONLY when it’s gifted the breath of life through our creativity and our sense of play – our ability to love.

Money is like clay before it’s been turned into a beautiful ceramic. It is transformed – fed a dose of life force – only through us enriching it first with our spirit.

We don’t ever have to do anything that doesn’t feed our inner sense of wonder and inspiration.

The other thing I know with every ounce of my being to be true (please test this for yourself) is that we don’t ever have to do anything that doesn’t feed our inner sense of wonder and inspiration.

And before you say…. There are some things we simply must do…. Go inside to where your radiance emanates from – your core – and see if this is actually true.

You may be surprised!

In the new world, that’s currently manifesting before our eyes the only ‘safe’ choice is to be unsafe in how you approach your work, your dreams, your interactions.

The only investment that will yield a dividend worth having is your investment in life.

This investment may well involve spending money on what would conventionally be considered stupid.

It may involve saying no to earning more in favour of spending time with people you love – eating beans on toast and not having the heating on for too long.

And – before I get a stream of emails saying that you must take care of the essentials, what I’m suggesting doesn’t mean that you don’t put food on the table! It means that you actively participate in the adventure of finding inspiring and joyful ways to do that.

We must learn to trust our bodies and relax.

Of course sometimes we’re just exhausted and can’t even begin to find a way to do this. Then we must learn to trust our bodies and relax enough so that we can again pick up the scent of aliveness, and follow where it is leading us.

It won’t always work out the way you want or expect, but you will discover that you are deeply present for your life and those you love in a fundamentally different way than convention would allow.

In a sense the ‘Career Master’ is always hovering around us – only now this presence of playing safe can help us take the risk of living, really living!

From today onwards, take the risk of creating something you actually love with all your hearts.

So what will you create in your life from now onwards?

Please share below in the comments section.

Blessings

Davide

Image courtesy of Abode of Chaos