This excerpt is the Money and Meaning blog of November 2, 2023 on the website, School for Financial Freedom. It is used by permission of the author, Douglas Tsoi, for which we are grateful.
I was listening to an interview of Franciscan mystic Richard Rohr, where he was describing one of his favorite ideas, Carl Jung’s two halves of life, with a partial transcript below:
“The first one (first half), you're building your ego structure where you're building your sense of self. You've got to have a few successes; you can't just be defeated, especially in your early pre-teen years and teen years. But if you spend too much time creating your ego structure, you think that's the only task there is.
This is our mania for being rich, for being famous, for living in the right part of town, for driving a big car, for having a trophy wife, that's all first half of life stuff. It’s not wrong, but it's not wisdom either, and it's not going to work to finally satisfy the soul or your need for meaning.
We're a society with a lot of elderly people but not a lot of elders because we have elderly people who are still living in the first half of life, still seeking ego affirmation, more money, more classy cars. And I'm not trying to be moralistic, I'm just talking in terms of the Soul.
The definition of being an addict is when you want more and more of what isn't working. If your success was really satisfying your soul, you wouldn't need more of it all the time. You wouldn't need more climbing. That's the point of the spiritual journey: The Iliad, the Odyssey, Gandhi, Jesus, they always leave home. You've got to leave your normal definition of success given to you by your family.”
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We’re a society with a lot of elderly people but not a lot of elders. That really caught me. Baby Boomers own 50% of the country’s $156 trillion in assets, and Gen X another 30%. What will happen to these assets if we never move from ego to Soul? What could happen if we did?
A few years ago, I attended a workshop by Lynne Twist called The Soul of Money, based on her book of the same name. Richard Rohr was also a student in my workshop, an example of someone, even at 78, still eager to learn and grow. He is a hero of mine, so I was so grateful to meet him.
There were so many deep lessons from that week. Lynne’s life is an example of someone who uses money in service to her life force, not vice versa. Just being in her presence was a soul transmission of living truthfully in the material world. She taught us that if you have integrity with how money goes through your life, you have freedom. If you use money to live consciously and in service, no matter how much money you have, you have true wealth. How many of us yearn for this different definition of success?
Lynne taught us that money should serve the deepest longing of our souls. Money doesn’t have any content itself, it only transmits awareness and intent. Our world is in significant need of repair, and she inspired us to think about our role in that. She told us that all change comes from change in narrative, and we need to find new stories of ourselves.
The lessons weren’t only from Lynne and Father Richard; it was a cohort of deep wisdom and sensitivity. One of my fellow classmates, Doug Lynam, a financial advisor and former monk, asked about my money: “Is it deepening your love for everything?”
I ask that question in my financial choices today.
As Jung and Rohr point out, the second half of life is the time for soul work. But if soul work doesn’t change our relationship to money, what exactly are we talking about? Has anything really changed? Or are we just spiritually bypassing the real work of transformation? This country needs new definitions of success, and it has to come from eldership.
This is the real spiritual journey.
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Better Capitalism recognizes and incorporates this real spiritual journey -- for individuals, businesses, governments and cultures. Whatever life stage or economic cycle we happen to be in, we need to pause and think about our decisions around finances. Questions are the engine of thought. Take time to think about the questions we ask.
Is your success satisfying your soul? Are you using your money to live consciously and in service? Is your allocation of resources deepening your love for the world around you? Is our world a better place because of the way individuals, businesses, governments and cultures think about and use money?
Honest answers to these and similar questions can help us see how we view our money, our definition of success, and our ultimate life goals. Aligning our finances to do soul-satisfying work is a critical step toward improving capitalism in our world, and who doesn't want to see a better capitalism? As with everything else, if we are to effect true change, we must begin with ourselves.
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