Episode Transcript
We Americans enjoy a wonderful and powerful way of life, but internally and in relationships, we may wish for better. Join me as we look beneath the surface and gain insights to transform every aspect of your life. My name is Dr. Ann O'Hare, and this is The Spiritual American. Hello, everyone, and welcome to the spiritual American. My name is Dr. Anne O'Hare, and I'm your host today. We are going to talk about money plus common sense. Hopefully this is a big one. It was definitely a big one for me. But before we get started, please consider like sharing and subscribing. This really helps us get this message out to many, many more people. And also consider sharing with your friends and families. Also if you'd like to comment, that also helps to stimulate the YouTube algorithm to get to more people. Okay, so today we're going to talk about money. Money is a big thing and also common sense. So I think I'm going to start by sharing my experience with this. So I grew up, as you all know, in the seventies and eighties, some, you want to say Gen XR. So that was the time period that I kind of came of age. And at that time,, for some reason, my parents didn't teach me too much about money, like how to handle money and that's okay. You know, it just wasn't, they, they handled it the way they handled it. And. I basically got myself into a lot of debt. And I remember the moment that it happened. I was about 18. I, you know, I got a bank account and I started, you know, how people start with money and things. And I remember I wanted something that I didn't have enough money for. I actually remember the moment that this happened. And I said, well, I need to wait until I have the money. And then I said, well, I can just charge it. And I'll tell you, it was that moment. It was like, I stepped out of the garden of Eden or something. Or so at that moment, I started down the slippery slope of debt. And so what happened after that was a long story, but over the next several years, I got myself into 36, 000 worth of debt. I know people get. Uh, into much higher or lower than that, but that was the number that I ended up with. And it was all credit card debt. It was all unsecured debt and I was, it was a disaster. I teach my child, I teach my son about money right away. You know, you try, you try to make a difference, right? Wherever you made a mistake, you try to fix it. But so this episode is about, and I'll finish the story in a second, but this episode is about the lessons learned. And also how to bring a spiritual slant, like the fixing the part that's wrong, doing what's right with it, and also bringing a spiritual part to it as well. So what happened? I got into 36, 000 in debt. I ended up moving back home with my parents because I was such a mess. I had to go get a job and, you know, I was a nurse, so it was fine. I could get a job. Thank goodness. And I worked myself out of debt. And what I did was I had a friend who was very good with money. And I said, I'll do whatever you want. Just tell me what to do. And I'm going to, I need to get this fixed. And so what she did was she made me, it's just an example, like how to fix the thing. So she made me,, just live with just cash for like, I don't know, six months. And I had to get a receipt for every single thing that I bought. So there was no credit card, no debit card, no checks on everything was cash. Let's had to pay a bill. Basically everything was cash and I had to get a receipt for everything. What did that do? That like disciplined me. So for those of you out there who have debt, so they remember how we always talk about the continuum, right? There's people who are like really in trouble with money. And then there's people who are like, okay with money, but maybe there's some debt. Maybe you'd like to tighten it up a bit. Maybe there's people that are really good with money and very disciplined and so forth. So I'm talking to the people in the middle there kind of, but I'm mentioning the downside because. If you are someone who's really in debt and really out of control, I would recommend getting some help, whether it's a really good friend or get some debt consolidation or something and make a decision that you're going to get out of that for good. So the thing I wrote down here, the first thing was dealing with debt. So debt is definitely something that is like a red alarm. It's like, I have to deal with it. It's like, my boat is sinking. My ship is sinking and I need to deal with the debt. Some people are afraid to deal with their debt because it feels so overwhelming, but my experience is that I use the debt consolidation company once also. There are resources out there. I would suggest. checking with a friend or whatever you really want to change it, you can reach out to a friend or a company like that. The last thing I'll say about debt is one good thing that I did was once I fixed it, I never, ever, ever got into debt again. And so I live on a debit card and an American express and both of those things get, you know, American express, you can't, finance it. And I've been living 20 years. So, I feel much better in that realm. So that's the debt part, the middle part, the part where, okay, I'm managing the bills, I'm managing the kids I'm managing, and I'm trying to, or I'm trying to, maybe buy things and manage my debt with my spending and all this kind of stuff. So what I want to say about that is that again, maybe you're feeling like I'm managing it. Okay. But maybe I'd like to get it a little bit tighter. One of the things that's good is if you have a friend, I'm going back to this friend thing again, talk to somebody else who's good at it to help you figure out where you can make an adjustment. Like, for instance, maybe I want to pay off this credit card and maybe I want to plan a trip. Some people are really good at this, like making those kinds of decisions. If you're good at making those kinds of decisions, like where do I try to pay off first and where do I do that? That's fine. If you're not so good at it, go to get some help. But the one aspect that I'd like to add to this middle ground is self care. Make sure that you're taking care of yourself also. And I'm not talking about like selfish, irresponsible. going after things. I'm talking about taking care of myself. Make sure you have your spending money on, good food as much as you can afford it. And, you know, look on if, even if you're not stopping the spending, see if you can look at it and say, is this good for me? Am I taking care of myself or responsibilities? Am I properly taking care of my responsibilities? So that would be the middle ground. Like the, and the, the point of this is common sense with money. So one common sense is pay off the debt. Right. Second common sense is in the middle, when I'm making these decisions, let me make sure I'm taking care of myself and I'm taking care of others. Let me make sure that what I'm spending it on is good quality. I'm within my means, I'm operating within my means, but I'm also, you know, having a good quality of life and providing a good quality of life to my children and my family and so forth. And, and also living,, as best I can within my means. It's the, it's funny how you can get. I think now with the, with what's going on in our economy right now, maybe people are less like overspending now. It's like we're struggling now, many of us are struggling to spend on food and things like that. But I still think this can apply because we can still prioritize even if we're struggling in some areas. Maybe this is the time to get some debt consolidation. Maybe this is the time to make some different choices. Again, everything's on a continuum. We have to do the best we can. But the third aspect that I'd like to talk about with money is service with money. So if one thing is the debt, and then there's the middle ground, and now here's the part where I want my money to be used in a worthwhile way. Now, if you're part of a church or any kind of spiritual organization or, you know, like religious organization, usually tithing or giving to the church or the temple is encouraged. And of course, there's a realistic worldly understanding that maybe there's some greed involved or whatever. But what I want to talk about is the karma of giving your money to a circumstance that you know it's going to be helpful to others. My father actually is a good example of this because he, he goes to, he's retired. So he goes and plays poker at the poker casino or whatever. He really enjoys that. And he goes there a couple of times a week. And whenever he wins money there, he sends half of it to St. Jude Children's Hospital. And he's really proud of that because he feels like, look, I'm going to go do this and I'm going to make money, but it's not just for me. I'm actually going to give half of it to the sick children. So that's kind of what I'm talking about. Whatever you think is good or important or helpful to others, try to see if you can find a way to give your money towards that. Sometimes we say you get a blessing from it. I, you know, these words are not very scientific, but I'm going to say in terms of your self respect and in terms of, if you look at money like energy, Like, remember we were talking about karma, like the comings and goings of energy, and we were talking about that in terms of interactions and relationships. But money is also an energy. It's your value. It's your life value. And you are the way it comes and goes and the way you manage it and the respect you have for it. is tied up with your own value. So if you have a lot of debt, I'm going to say it's very difficult to be happy if you're in debt, very difficult to be happy because you owe something. If I owe, I'm really not feeling very good inside myself. If I'm paid off and I don't owe anybody, I would feel much better, right? Much more independent. So if I have debt, I'm not going to feel very good in the middle ground. What I want to do is I want to get to the point where on one hand, I'm able to make those decisions properly and that I feel good about them. Like I feel, I trust my own judgment to figure out what's the priority and to be able to direct to the financial energy, wherever it needs to go, and then to be able to fulfill the responsibilities and take care of myself in the best way possible, maybe having to. You know, prioritize and so forth. And then finally the service. So I can't, I can't really emphasize service enough. Service with money is very powerful. I don't want to share too much., you don't want to say what you've done because it's not really about ego, but let me say, I do have experience with giving money away. I do have an experience with. You know, uh, donating to or contributing to the Brahma Kumaris, which is the organization because we don't charge for any of our classes. So everything is by contributions. But I know that they're, that the Brahma Kumaris is doing very good service because they're teaching meditation and spiritual knowledge and for the whole world and it's free. So that's something that I can get behind. And so I put my money behind it too. There's an expression, put your money where your mouth is. But in this case, you don't just want it to be. ordinary, you want to be able, the money to be used for something important, something that you believe in, something that you think is good, whether it's healing, whether it's spiritual, whether it's for a certain group of people that are suffering or maybe to be helpful, anything like that, you're going to get a return for that. Remember we were talking about how karma works, right? You get a return for that. And also, you want to say that the highest way to use your money. So this continuum that I've used for this talk is like, you know, the low, the low, the middle and the high, the service is the high part. So we want to take, you know, when, and do pick something that you believe in. I know that in the past, many of us have heard, you know, churches asking for money and then we see different churches showing up to be using the money inappropriately and so forth. And That's kind of a betrayal. So I would say choose your charities wisely or choose whatever you're going to do wisely. Do your research and make sure that the money that you're giving actually is going to the people or the cause that you would like it to go to. But I feel that that helps our self esteem and it fortifies our self respect and we're actually physically helping people. So you are giving and you are putting yourself in a position to give and that is the highest level. So. In this I wish I was interactive right now because I'd love to hear from you. Maybe you guys can put the comments, put some comments in there about struggles with money or how, how you've been able to work these things. Actually, what I want to share too, is that we should be working on all three of these things at once. I know that sounds strange. All of us may be good at one area and not so good at another. So maybe take a look today, write down these three things. So one is debt. The middle one is self care and responsibilities, and then the top one is service. Maybe write down those three areas, and see, give yourself a grade on all of those. How am I doing in each one of these? And so I would suggest that continue to work on all three of those. I can tell you from my experience that right now, after getting out of that debt and living in a certain way, I've kind of got the debt thing under control. And I, and I don't cross that line. I don't use credit cards. If I do use anything on credit, it's usually a, no interest for 12 months or something and then I just pay it off. So I don't pay any interest. So that's something the line that I haven't gone back over. But one of the things that you can do is to, like I said, work with a friend or work with your spouse or work with whatever to get more and more of a mastery over that middle ground. And then of course, come up with a way to give for service. So I'm going to leave it there. It may have been a little shorter than usual, but that's just a little bit of a, some ideas to think about. Maybe a context to think about it, to understand that, wow, I have to look at these in three different ways and see where I am and try to get everything into balance. Ultimately, we want to get the debt out of the way, right? Because we want to get that totally gone. And then you master the middle and then focus on the top part, the service. So I'll leave it there. Remember that our slogan is Heal, Empower and Serve. And again, we, you can even look at Heal, Empower and Serve as those three levels, right? Debt would be the healing. Like I get out of debt, that's the healing. Empower is where I get mastery and learn how to help myself and get and manage all these things, self care responsibilities. And then service would be the higher level. So I hope you enjoyed this and until next time, take care. You
