Wednesday is Question and Answer Day on the blog…a time for exploring many of the questions that people have recently asked about the nine Conversations with God books and the New Spirituality. Here’s this week’s entry…
Topic: Wanting and Choosing
Question asked by: Tricia Bratton
Question: I remember in your book, I think it was the transcript of a talk you gave on abundance, you made the comment that you were wearing expensive Italian shoes, and that it took you a long time to be comfortable with wearing shoes that cost that much.
I know I have some work to do in the area of lack and abundance. I work a lot with the poor and the homeless. Last year I went to Nicaragua, where we fed a meal to families and children who scrounge through refuse in the dump outside of their town in order to survive. I came away from that experience feeling almost embarrassed by the excess of our country, and even myself, in the light of such need, in realizing that we throw away more food at a meal than these people eat in a day or a week.I wondered how much do I really need, and can I live more simply and fully without such material excess? If we are all one, and the suffering of others affects me, don’t I have a responsibility to pare down my excesses and material comforts?
I used to resent the rich, and I don’t anymore. I know some good and loving wealthy people. But I struggle with discerning how much do I really need to use of the earth’s resources when my excesses are so extreme in light of the world’s poor?
I understand my struggle with abundance and lack creates the money issues I have at the present time. And I am eager to overcome it. I am just not sure how to change my thought about this matter.
Neale’s Response: I believe that we might all benefit from the adage, “Live simply, so that others may simply live.” I do not believe, however, that this means we may not have any “luxuries” in our lives. An occasional luxury is a wonderful experience, and us giving ourselves that offers a wonderful example. It does not teach anyone anything for us to live without nice things that we can afford. Luxury to excess — which is what I believe you are talking about, Tricia — is something I have sought to avoid.
Changing your experience of lack is about changing your thought that there is “not enough.” CwG in the first chapter of the first book says that the three basic principles of life are:
1. We are all one.
2. There’s enough.
3. There’s nothing we have to do.
Those foundational principles, setting the tone for the entire 9 books that follow, encapsulate the Conversations with God message. These statements alone could change the world.
(Ask Neale may be accessed on a daily basis in the Messengers’ Circle at Neale’s personal website: www.nealedonaldwalsch.com. Each week Neale selects a question from those posted there and publishes it in this blog.)