Money: the medium of truth
It was an ordinary day well apart from the home clothes we were wearing at school for a change away from the usual uniform and the naming of the day as entrepreneurship day when I made a small purchase of something I do not even remember. I had paid with a big note well that is if you consider R50(about $3) a particularly big note, I was then handed quite some change. Later on, I realized to my shock and horror that I was handed half a R10(about USD62c) note which I did not notice because it was wrapped neatly in other bills. When I found out it wasn’t amusing well, my initial reaction was anger and fury. As I began thinking about the incident I decided not to confront the 7th year learners who had tricked me with this bill because I understood that even if I could complain and get my money back that does not really solve anything, I realized that this is a much bigger issue then half a R10 note and perhaps can be used to define how people think of money. You see this note tells a story of greed and I have used it to remind me of a lesson which in simple words is “everyone is trying to chase more green beware those you encounter who hold that intention at the deepest level but hold no ethics or morals, for it is them fuelled with greed who will do anything for a slight gain for more.”
The way most people see money is through the lens of luxury, you can hardly go a day in pop culture without hearing the phrase “I want to be rich” which at its core is pointless, what’s the point of being the richest person in the cemetery? As Elon Musk said — Money is not something to be accumulated in vast quantities but rather should be used as fuel to achieve greater missions such as landing a man on Mars. Money is not the root of all evil but the mirror upon which evil or good can reveal itself. Be careful what you wish for, the more money you have the deeper the uncomfortable truths about yourself become. As the great philosopher, Notorious B.I.G once said ‘mo money mo problems’. Was it not Frederich Nietzsche who warned us a century or so ago by saying —: if you stare long enough into the abyss, the abyss will stare back at you” in other words if you spend all your life chasing as much money as possible you inevitably become the thing or type of person you once loathed as a younger person. Very rarely will they remember you for the amount of money you make but rather the amounts of lives you changed.
Money perhaps more than any other thing in the world is the most misunderstood. Money is simply the storage of value a glorified “I owe you” note if you will. It allowed us to move from barter trading to factories, airplanes in skies, rockets on the moon, and beyond which otherwise would have been not possible. Money for most people holds within it hope, hope that tomorrow will be a better day than today. Let us not hate those who have more money than us, let us indeed seek to provide real-world value such that someday we too can be of great wealth. They say chase your dreams and the money will follow, I beg to differ, money is being made in places where big problems are being solved and that’s the idea of money, money is a guide to incentivize and reward those who dare to solve the worlds most complex problems. Want to be rich? Solve a problem that huge masses are experiencing whether that be fulfilling a creative need through music or good health as a doctor or starting a business as long as people are willing to pay for it you will create real wealth. whether we are capitalists, communists,s or anything in between we can agree that the distribution of money is necessary for peace and harmony itself to exist.
Perhaps the greatest lesson we can take from Money is the fact that it never losses its value: I can squash, folded up, step on it and it will still hold the same value it had prior. This is a life lesson that we should all carry as we navigate our lives, no matter how different you look, how damaged you may think you are, or how lucky you are, you still have immense value within you that you have to see before the world actually sees it. When normal things such as wood and chemicals are put together we form money a creation that changed everything and thus if seemingly ordinary people join forces we can achieve that which was believed to be fiction and the stuff of dreamers.
Isn’t it sad how we put a champion of freedom and equality on a piece of paper most people are enslaved to? It is perhaps symbolic of the growing inequality we face how the top 1% own more wealth than the combined bottom 50%. But let us not be too quick to blame it on the rich for in most cases you realize that devil is within. As of 2012 If you make more than $32k you are in the top 1% of global earners, instead of pointing the finger upward in the hierarchy of money accumulation, we as individuals and a collective should seek to do the things that our leaders fail to do, money is power and we should you unite to honor some of the great people who’s face is on all our notes by building that just and equal world they dreamed off. Money’s greatest trick was to convince us to have more of it than other people while it united us all against it.
