BUDDHIST BUCKS

The power of money, like karate, is the power of the empty hand. To have money and not spend it is power, the power of non-action, literally potential. How many do-dads do you really need anyway? The worst thing about money is having to think, worry, or obsess over it. This can happen with either too little or too much of it, and becomes all you ever think about. As with everything, the middle path is the best, avoiding extremes. Buddhism is at its best as an antidote to high-stress modern Western-type lifestyles. In the absence of such, it might seem like a religion of passivity. It’s almost as if the Buddha foresaw what was to come and prescribed a cure in advance. This might violate causality, but nothing better has been prescribed that doesn’t. Maybe there was something innate in the Indo-European mentality that knew what was likely and that the Indo would have a prominent role to play as antidote to the Euro. You can always back-fill logic later: how do I know what I mean until I see how much money’s at stake? People who can save their money are masters of the world; those who can’t are slaves. The former are creditors; the latter are debtors. Little by little money accrues to the creditor’s account at the expense of the debtor, over and beyond the current debt load. This is trickle-up economics.

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