Our society encourages to 'push through' at all costs, regardless of how you are coping in life. If you become unmotivated in the modern economical system, you are shipped off to mental health departments, where you're made to feel that there is something wrong with you.
If you consider how our lives are planned out for us by society for example; go to school in preparation for the real world, then work 80% of your life in hope that one day you will be able to retire and live how you want, then it makes sense that people 'get over it'. If you really contemplate this life we have created for ourselves, a life that completely revolves around making money and monetary wealth, then you will soon see how ridiculously archaic both our society and system is.
When we are so focused on making money to be financially secure, we start revolving our whole existence in acquiring 'wants' and fulfilling desire. The desire loop is a continual chase, because desire only provides short term gratification and doesn't nourish the soul. Once you have fulfilled a desire, the emptiness appears, and a new desire is needed to 'fill the hole'.
This continual chase for money or even making ends meet, distracts us from the true meaning of life and interferes with our self-connection. In the pursuit of making money, working hard, paying bills and financial responsibility, stress is created which we endure. This stress accumulates in our body until it cannot cope any longer and many find themselves turning to an addiction or a distraction. Eg. Drugs, alcohol, shopping, digital, sex, pornography, or it may manifest as physical illness.
You only need to look at the rising numbers of anxiety and depression statistics in order to see that our way of living doesn't serve us anymore. Chasing financial freedom is only about self, but in a superficial way, it doesn’t support our need to fulfil our collective purpose and true nature. It divides, rather than uniting us.
Our society does not only teach us how to desire, it also promotes it in many ways unconsciously. It encourages us to be ambitious, leaving us in a total state of competition. Competition always has a measured result, with a winner and a loser and that is how we live our lives. Now more than ever right across the globe, people are in a highly competitive state. When we continually live in this high state of competitiveness we only see 'I' and the desire to be and want more. The desire to be in peak performance focuses our attention on 'I' and is totally self-serving, the further we continue down this path the more we disconnect ourselves from 'we'. It is the feeder of narcissistic behaviour and self righteousness.
Nothing is for free, but being free costs nothing
The world is a transaction
Our world has become a series of transactions, whereby we give with an underlying expectation of receiving something in return (money). We love to help each other, but it is always followed with an invoice. This transactional way of living finds us trying to manipulate people into believing that they are missing something, needing more of something, or wanting to become something. It has a hidden agenda that you will be better, but better comes at a cost. This idea has been fuelled by unconscious ignorance that is imposed on us by society, through our education and our way of living. Many times in our lives we have been told that we are failures or are substandard. Some were even told that they won't amount to anything.
It is in the teachings of 'we are not enough' that we endlessly desire more.
Giving and taking Vs. Giving and receiving
In this modern era of giving there is an underlying expectation of taking something in return, which isn't actually giving itself. In one sense you are 'giving', but at the same time pulling the carpet from under 'giving'. It is a state of circular manipulation, where I manipulate you and you manipulate me. This has become a mutual understanding and a way of living in our society, but the result doesn't nourish our soul for happiness.
Bill Gates tells a story of the richest man in the world. This man was a newspaper vendor on the streets, who frequently gave Bill Gates a newspaper at no cost as he had no money at the time. Later on in life when Bill Gates made his fortune he found this vendor and told him that he would write him a cheque for any amount in return for his good nature. The man said "no thank you" to the offer and continued with something similar to "I gave to you when I had nothing, you give when you have everything". Wow. This could be one of the most powerful statements for mankind.
It has been researched that our society is becoming less empathetic over the past 30 years, but you don’t need research to understand that people are more unhappy than they have ever been before.
If we give from the nature of our soul, nothing is expected in return. When we give with no agenda, we receive so much more than what money can offer, it is priceless. When we consider others on a higher level than ourselves, we are rewarded and our soul is nourished. This is our collective purpose. We cannot fulfil our collective purpose when we are so focused on 'I'. We need to transcend 'I' and our personal desire before we can effectively contribute to collective happiness.
