Your Meaningful Money Makeover
Creative Writing Assignment
So, did you do the exercise If Money Was a Person, Who Would Money Be? Or did you turn it into Shelf-Help?
Shelf-Help is when you buy a Self-Help book, scan through it — or even read it in its entirety — think it’s brilliant for about five minutes, and then put it on the shelf without actually implementing it. It sits there staring at you, reminding you that you now possess the tools to change something about your life, but for a variety of reasons, you still haven’t got around to implementing the Action Steps it advises. The guilt you feel for NOT using it to help yourself feeds a sense of externalized resentment. Pretty soon, the Self-Help has become Shelf-Help, and you have to hate it and distance yourself from it — avoid it.
The worst part about it is that you know deep down this doesn’t work.
You probably DID consider Who Money has been in your world, Who Money should be… You thought about it once, when you read my article, or you even followed through and actually engaged in the exercise more fully — maybe you already wrote it down somewhere — but did the buck stop there?
The Personification of Money is a critical spiritual exercise, for a few reasons:
- You interact with Money as deeply and as often as any living person you know
- You believe in Money as much or more than you do your God, your Guardian Angels, your Spirit Guides (at least, you certainly behave as if you do — you think about Money everyday; do you think about your spirit everyday?)
- No abstract concept has a greater tangible effect on your life
- Many of the techniques required to personify and talk to Money come from the same head space that you must employ to communicate with your spirit guides
- Money / Abundance is one of the oldest, most enduring relationships you have
- Your relationship with Money is most likely to remain dysfunctional, because you don’t treat it as a relationship that can be improved upon
Our relationships with Money and how we manifest Abundance is the most accessible and universal spiritual communication I have observed. I’m turning this into a tag for other bloggers because it doesn’t matter what your belief system is, it doesn’t matter what your level of “psychic ability” is, it doesn’t matter what you blog about, what your career is, or how you define yourself — it doesn’t even matter if you just want to Pretend this relationship — the enthusiasm that Shift Your Spirits readers have shown for Morgana’s concept of Financial Alchemy is awesome!
You can’t afford for this eye-opening Money Makeover to become Shelf-Help.
You can’t have a great first-date with your new, improved, more desirable personification of Money, and then go back to speed-dialing the old asshole Money you’ve been living with all these years. Did Morgana’s concept (shared via my article) introduce you to the perfect financial Partner, but then you just went back to the abusive, co-dependent, dysfunctional relationship you’re used to?
Okay, I’ll go first, and then I’ll lay out the assignment — and a list of the other bloggers I’m tagging — at the end of this post.
Slade’s Money Makeover
I started a diary to solidify my commitment to changing my relationship with Money. I call the journal Hornets to Honey Bees — How I Married New Money
Old Money Profile
Old Money for me was a ripped, handsome, well-dressed, attractive dude who looked great on the outside — expensive haircut — one of those dickwads who may or may not be deserving of a nomination to the People Magazine’s Sexiest Men Alive List — he was vain, cold, arrogant, self-important, sadistic, selfish, and completely devoid of affection.
I might compare him to the main character in Bret Easton Ellis’ novel American Psycho - he worked out all the time, he was obsessed with his appearance, with projecting the image of perfection. He wore designer clothing, and was an absolute snob about material things — the more expensive, the more valuable.
He valued Things, not people. He was nice to people in order to manipulate them. He came first.
Clearly, the guy was unlikeable, but he brainwashed me for most of my life. He constantly nagged me to be more like him. He disparaged the things I loved to do that didn’t have a quantifiable income stream attached to them. He browbeat me, constantly reminded me that I was inferior to him.
He said things to me like “You’re going to wear THAT? Why are you wasting time on THAT? You’re never going to get anywhere doing THAT! Why are you talking to THAT person? Do you want to be a nobody? You’ll never be rich; priests aren’t rich. Spiritual people suffer. Ugly people are ignored. Weak people are walked on. Artists starve.”
And always, behind these messages, the lie that He was my answer. He would save me. He was my only hope. If I did what he said, my life would improve.
Total passive aggressive — he liked to convince me that I was “lucky” to have him. That he only wanted what was best for me. He nagged me because he cared. He wanted to see me better myself. He hated to see me suffer.
What would I do without him? How would I survive? If I left him, I would be out on the street, homeless.
Without him, I was nothing.
Deep down, I hated him. I knew he wasn’t good for me, but I believed the poison he was feeding me; I was addicted to his mindset, I envied him, I was afraid of what he was capable of, I walked on egg-shells around him.
I tried not to make him angry at me, but mostly, I ignored him.
I avoided him as long as I could, and then when I DID have to talk to him, it was all apologies and martyrdom. I could never figure out which was worse — trying to do what he said and keep him happy all the time, or suffer the intermittent consequences of his violent outbursts?
If I didn’t let him in, he’d eventually kick the door down and there would be SCENES — he’d wave NSF notices and bounced checks in my face and tell me what a fucking IDIOT I was…
My parents, and everyone around me, seemed to have a similar relationship with him — only some people were able to kiss his ass, and they were rewarded for doing so. Everyone seemed to either go along with him, or suffer the consequences of defying him. He was a tyrant. He was powerful, he yanked everyone’s chains. You were either with him or against him. You were either in his pockets, in his good graces, or on his shit list and out in the cold.
And if Money didn’t favor you, it was your own damn fault.
Lack and fear are control tactics, lies about self-worth, the basis for slavery and power-over others, the Haves and the Have-Nots System was created by one group, but perpetuated by all.
New Money Profile
I knew (spiritually) that God is love, that Abundance is everywhere, that the Universe has enough for everything in it. As I started to envision a personification of Money who reflected this type of benevolent leadership or representation, I discovered — not surprisingly — that the Money I WANTED to be with greatly resembled my idea of the perfect partner.
Morgana’s original epiphany began when she observed this connection — that there is a parallel between Marriage and Money — that people who engage in dysfunctional, co-dependent relationships tend to exhibit the same behavior patterns — that the kinds of challenges and repercussions they experience in their Love Lives are almost identical to the cycles and struggles they go round and round in their Financial Lives.
As Morgana shared the dialogue between her and Money, I couldn’t help but note the similarity to a screenplay — her conversations with Money were almost identical to cliched scenes from a soap opera — the lines were the same as pleading with a lover, and I imagined how easy it would be to replace the name “Money” with “Honey” — a term of endearment you might use in place of your partner’s name, in arguments or happier contexts.
So as I wrote out my personal dramas in screenplay format, and when I spoke to Money, I called him Honey.
My friend Pam, years and years ago, told me she named her perception of God “Honey” because of the apiary/ spirit metaphor that exists between Bee Keeping and the Human Soul. “God’s the Honey; I’m the Bee.” She said the name Honey evoked warmth, nurturing, sweetness, harvest, natural forces, gold, etc…
I call God “God” for reasons I won’t go into here and now, but the name Honey was perfect for my personification of Abundance, and it made the creative dialogue familiar and believable.
My Honey is someone who has everything he could ever need, materially — he lacks for nothing. Because of this, he has no fear of want. He is SO wealthy, that he has transcended the worry and anxiety of NEEDING anything. He is free to focus on what he WANTS. His material existence is totally and infinitely taken care of, and so he is entirely ambitious about matters of the soul.
He is not searching for his next meal, he is looking for joy. His challenge is to find all the things that material wealth CAN’T buy.
How does my self-esteem hold up in the face of this kind of partner? If he doesn’t NEED anything from me, if there’s nothing I can give him that he can’t give himself, then why would he want to be with me?
What does he GET from me that can’t be browbeaten out of me, ordered, or bought?
Most importantly, what do I have to GIVE him that no one else can?
I envision my conversations with him to take place at a kitchen table at his farm. He lives on a ranch, an Adirondack-style log cabin mansion that is absolutely obscenely gorgeous — but it’s not intimidating, so much as it is wonderfully, opulently comfortable. When we are together, we talk over a table that has anything on it I could ever want to eat. I am not required to pretend to be someone I’m not.
He could wear anything he wants to in the world, but he dresses like a lumberjack, a blue-collar worker — he wears flannel shirts and jeans. He is handsome, but without vanity. He is attractive because he laughs with his eyes, and because he doesn’t talk nearly so much as he listens to me.
He doesn’t care what I look like, he does not judge me, he wants to sit and talk to me for all the right reasons.
And when I ask him “What do you want of me? Why do you want to be with me and share all the abundance that you have? What can I possibly bring to you that no one else can?”
He tells me “I want your Stories. I want your Words. I want the Passion of your Spirit, I want to hear your Wisdom, I want to listen to your infectious Wonder. It brings me Joy to witness you articulating your Own Joy. That is the thing that no one else can offer me. That is the priceless thing without a price tag. You are the only source of it.”
When I tell him I need Wealth and ask him what I should do to achieve Meaningful Wealth — in all its forms — his answer is always the same:
He tells me to Write, from the heart, the stories only I can, as I am here, right now.
He is right. My magic is in my words. The wealth I receive as a result of sharing my words is multidimensional — beyond my greatest intentions.
So, I asked my Guides, my Guardian Angels, and Mother Mary for a Spiritual Restraining Order against the Old Money, who I now think of as a Hornet or a Wasp, the dark twin of the Honey Bee.
The Hornet is not allowed to come near me — I do not wish to speak with him, ever again, for any reason, without exception. I have totally divorced him. I consider him to be a dangerous stalker who I have willfully chosen to break free from.
And like all restraining orders, they don’t work if you answer the phone when your attacker calls, if you go back to him and continue to participate in the co-dependent unhealthy relationship. The Courts can’t protect you if you breakdown, if you relax your resolve, if you back-slide and revert to old familiar patterns — you can’t hear him unless you let him in to whisper his lies. And you can never be rid of his poison until you refuse it and disown it.
The Hornet is DEAD to me. I’d have to be insane to continue a relationship with him, now that I have met his replacement. I’ve married a new money, and we’re on our Honeymoon.
Where do these blog tags START?
Someone has to plant them — start them — right? I love a writing assignment, I usually find the restrictions liberating, but I’ve only managed to fulfill the recent tagging exercises by totally deforming the rules of the game. I was one of those 8 year olds that liked to elaborate the rules of Monopoly to a ridiculous extreme. In my family, part of the fun of a board game was spontaneous adaptation. It’s amazing the way that kids play — they turn House & Office — the opposite of adult desire or fun — into creative performance art.
My present lifestyle and my aspirations toward a willful, inventive sense of spirituality have grown into a love-affair with my homespun brand of chaos magic. In my rich inner landscape (that’s what we say when crazy is too disparaging — when eccentric feels over-used, self-indulgent, and increasingly-impotent — when eclectic sounds like the only, obvious, inevitable label consciousness would ever agree to…) I tend a forest of creative kudzu, a mountain of vines, a blissful jungle. It’s abundant and ripe for the scavenger hunts of motivational blogging and personal memoir — bring it on, I say, tag me!
But I love starting things.
I’ve got a bad case of Birth Order Entitlement — I’m the oldest among the siblings and cousins who made up my earliest creative community. Now I have these grown-up writing peers to play with.
Here’s Your Assignment:
I want to hear about YOUR Money Makeover.
Read about Morgana’s Exercise and consider the following in your story:
- Who’s the Old Money?
- Who’s the New Money?
- What’s THE one thing — the overarching Message — your New Money advises you to do to invite Meaningful Abundance into your life?
Writing it down will help you to manifest the change you wish to see.
If you already have a blog, consider yourself TAGGED with this writing assignment.
- Write a post about your Money Makeover
- link back to this post
- You might also leave a comment here letting us know where to find your Money Makeover article
If you don’t have a blog of your own, but you want to participate, well, here’s another good reason to start one. You can go to Blogger.com or Myspace.com or Wordpress.com or Vox.com and start one for free, right now, in five minutes.
A few other options for participation:
Simply leave the results of your Money Makeover here in the Comments.
OR
If you have a really good one and feel it’s a little long for a Comment, but you’d like to share it, contact me about running your story here, on Shift Your Spirits, as a Guest Blogger.
OR
If you feel that the post would stray too far off-topic for your own blog, Contact me about sharing your Money Makeover as a Guest Blogger, here on Shift Your Spirits.
If you’re reading this — period — consider yourself tagged. My tags are not exclusive — they are open to anyone who wants to participate — take this tag and run with it. Go forth and tag others.
You’re IT:
To get the ball rolling, I’m going to name a few bloggers whose Money Makeovers I’d definitely like to read:
- Sojourner
- Adam
- Jeff
- Angela-Eloise
- Damian
- Kay
- Erik
- Mandy
- Deb
- Jason
- Tony
- KL Masina
- Sally Stoneking (which has to be one of the coolest Fairie Names ever!)
Seek Wisdom - Practice Love
Contacting Your Spirit Guides - 101
Free resources for Shift Your Spirits readers:
- Read the ebook by Slade Roberson especially for beginners who want to know who/what spirit guides are and how to communicate with them
- Listen to the mp3 preview of the Spirit Guide Attunement portion of the Talking to Your Spirit Guides class by Slade Roberson
- Try the meditation to Meet a Guide contributed by Jeff Lilly of Druid Journal
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54 Responses to “Your Meaningful Money Makeover”
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It will take me a little while to get to this tag, because Mr. Moneybags has told me to be an artist.
What a great idea to think of money as a spiritual, meaningful relationship. I have posted my response to your meme call over at my blog.
Gee, Slade, why don’t you ask for something easier, like single-handedly achieving world peace?
Angela-Eloise,
There’s a little-known secret about Creative Writing assignments, which those who have achieved degrees in Writing know, but other students don’t realize - it’s impossible to fail the assignment unless you just DO NOT do it.
There’s no better test for a writer to take - all the answers result from simply discussing what you DO know.
Come on - it’s gotta be easier than Defining Success and turning it into a Top 10 List?
I know you’re teasing, and I tagged because I am truly interested in seeing what you come up with, darling.
: )
Sojourner,
Thank you for playing along, I love your articulation of the conclusion you come away with from this exercise:
Your use of the word Reciprocal is a revelation. And the notion of safety and protection.
Sojourner,
I just discovered your awarding SYS the label gastblogschaft. I would’ve never guessed there was a word for such a complex notion (not that there could NOT be, just that someone has already done so). Thank you for noticing, and naming it for me.
The concept is something I will definitely have to introduce to PageCoach readers!
I woke up at 2, could not go back to sleep, started reading and could not put the book down. You want good, creative writing? Read anything by Anne Patchett. I was reading Bel Canto.
Then of course I picked up my computer, read your challenge and started writing. This is the introduction I got finished before I had to try to get a little sleep (a dog barking outside woke me up or I might still be sleeping!). I’ll finish later today (after much, much coffee) and post on my blog.
~-~
Few things come with as many demons as money. Our human relationship with money is dizzyingly complex and more often than not it brings out the worst in us. Throughout the entirety of human history, money - or its equivalent - has led people to do all sorts of morally and legally questionable things and money is the motivator for all kinds of behavior, most of it nothing that people would be readily willing to admit to. Yes, people do use money to do good things, but you rarely hear about someone being rewarded with money for doing something good. Why do you think that poverty is so often associated with virtue?
For me, attaching a moral value to money is precisely the problem. As magickal people, we learn that energy is neither positive nor negative, it simply exists. How we choose to use energy is where our ethics guide us. Likewise, money is a neutral thing; how we behave in response to money - getting it, spending it - is when morality comes into play. I don’t believe that having money automatically makes you immoral and I don’t believe that poverty makes you virtuous. I also have never accepted the view that just because someone has a lot of money that that makes them somehow special or better than anyone else. Money simply is.
But considering money from a philosophical point of view - or any other point of view for that matter - is anything but simple. And writing about one’s own personal relationship with money, well that’s downright terrifying! Why is it terrifying? Because it forces you to face your demons and to be honest about them. Facing one’s demons is difficult and most people are content never to do it at all.
As part of my shamanic training I spent a lot of time confronting my shadow self. It is not quite as scary to do again once you’ve done it before and you know what a transformational experience it can be. So I can, and will, face my personal demons about money so that I can answer Slade’s call to write about it.
In my story there is Older Money, Old Money, and New Money.
(to be continued at Blogickal
Adam,
Mr. Moneybags is a good name for him, anyway.
I like the name Buck, also : )
Angela-Eloise, that was actually my idea for a tag to start… Seriously.
I’m just putting it off so that I can think of a way to ask the question in a way that people would both respond and learn from their response.
Mr. A. Buck Moneybags… (’A’ stands for Abstract, but everyone just calls him ‘Buck.’
)
The representation of Money that I have hasn’t supplied a name, as abstracts rarely do, but that certainly is a good nickname.
Angela-Eloise,
Preach it, sister!
I am particularly in LOVE with your Teaser/Trailer approach to writing in between Sladespace and your own - starting the conversation here, with a cliff-hanger link to your deeper discussion to come…
Brilliant use of blogospherical tools. You just took the trackback/and the hyperlink, and danced with it like one of those gymnastic chicks with the ribbon-on-a-stick.
Elegant - Lovely - Blogickal!
That’s some techno-spellcraftin, right there…
I will be adopting this approach.
Adam,
Yes, the approach of leading the reader through their own expression of this idea is crucial.
My hope is that a creative relationship with the Money archetype is more accessible than the Higher Self or various members of your God Posse… I think the Native American notion of the Animal Totem (or Power Animal) might also be one people would be quick to wrap their minds around.
This exercise could be considered a basis for exploring and identifying an entire Personal Pantheon.
I wish I had a line of Shift Your Spirits Action Figures you could adopt…
Right now I’m a teacher, but a couple years ago I had some major role confusion because I was simultaneously a grad student and a college teacher. I even lived in a dorm where the guy next door was taking the class that I taught from another grad student. This overlap gave me ample opportunity for reflection on the classroom setting and inspiration for reading books like Ivan Illich’s Deschooling Society and Grace Llewellyn’s The Teenage Liberation Handbook. These books, especially the Illich, suggested that if spirituality can, or perhaps needs to be liberated from organized religion, then learning and thought also might need a liberation from institutionalized education.
One of the things I realized during this time was the way that grades are kind of an alternate economy. Some people go to school in hopes of converting their grades directly into money. Others, although they’re ‘liberal arts’ types and consequently are supposed to be striving for something other than getting rich, they still use grades as a kind of legitimizer of what they are doing. Some people are striving for the almighty dollar while others are searching for the almighty A.
So, in the spirit of adapting the rules, or maybe in this case applying the same rules to a different game, I’m suggesting an alternative assignment. Who is grades? Old grades? New grades? For those not in the educational environment, perhaps thinking along these lines might provide a useful comparison because most of us have lived in a grade economy, but now we don’t anymore, so we might have a bit more critical distance. And no, I haven’t done the original assignment yet. Do I get points counted off for being late?
Rob,
Very interesting that you bring up Grades as currency - this was perhaps the most difficult adjustment I had to make as an adult. I graduated from college with a 4.0 - I was obsessed with at least ALWAYS making an A on ALL papers. (I was prepared to “deal” with an A- or B+ in a math class, maybe, but a Red Pen was NOT happening…)
I had suffered from having a less than stellar GPA in High School - because I was too busy being bored to death or persecuted - and because of that my power in choosing schools was… well, royally fucked.
In the insulation of the school environment, in the currency of writing ability and participating in classes - in communicating in general - I was as wealthy as I could possibly be within those contexts. I had great external power and influence.
I felt like I was getting away with murder - basically, my profession was reading and writing and talking. And there was a social currency that adults heap on bright young articulate college students with 4.0 GPAs.
Too bad the world outside, the job market, did not resemble academia. I found I was holding faerie currency - leprechaun gold - what I identified as my wealth evaporated into worthless.
There was no bridge, there was no half-way house, there was no exchange system. I walked the plank into poverty.
It took me a decade and a half - and some major life detours - to build that bridge, to create, to invent that conversion of wealth…
A’s are Not Dollars, certainly. It’s almost perverted the chasm between the two currencies…
Did I just do YOUR assignment?
I think you’re right - there was an Older Money - in my teens and early 20s. He was cruelly and unexpectedly murdered when we left the academic environment. He was a Carver Bee, I suppose. The Old Money I’ve detailed here is actually my second marriage to the Material - the Hornet was the overlord of my 20s and early 30’s, employed, no doubt, by my Saturn Return in Taurus. So, in a way, he wasn’t a mistake I made - he was exactly what I contracted with to learn what I had to.
My current relationship with Money, and my success in this media, is much closer to the first. But the Academic One - the Grade - he was still ego-driven and fearful and immature. This new Money relationship for me could only be possible because of what I’ve learned from all of them.
All Is As It Should Be.
The Shift is the willful, conscious awareness…
Et, voila:
Meeting the Right Money: a story of personal archetypes
Rob and Slade - interesting perspective on grades as currency. It makes me think about how many other forms of “currency” there are - beauty for example.
Slade -
About “Gastblogschaft” - The word was first used on my blog by Bernulf Oswin of Expanding Inward back in August when he was a guess blogger for me back in August. In a conversation that we had through the comments on my blog, he came up with the final concept.
I think that people should be involved with their readers and respond to the comments left for them. You do this with style.
Sojourner,
Thank you - You should see my emails!
: )
Responding personally to every reader is VERY important to me. Correspondence effortlessly reveals a writer’s most Authentic voice.
Slade,
My assignment has been completed. You can find it at:
http://bethechangetreadthepath.blogspot.com/2007/03/magic-in-money-magic-in-me-money-has.html
And here was me thinking I’d already faced my greatest fears - Hope you enjoy.
Take care
Damian
Rob,
Actually, you know, I don’t think the “assignment” should be altered without going through the Personal Reflection first.
The whole point is to examine YOUR relationship with value — no one here will argue with you that the social concepts are flawed — but the social deconstruction could stretch on infinitely.
While part of the struggles we are dealing with may arise from taking on the value systems of others — identifying that is only part of the process — without willfully creating, inventing, CHOOSING an alternative — one that works for you and you alone — within your own private belief system — you miss the whole point — the chance for epiphany.
It has come to my attention that your comment subverts the “I” pronoun — the core of this exercise — you’re using a lot of “WE”s here…
Just so everyone understands where I was going with THIS exercise — this is not a discussion about OUR definition of value, money, or abundance — other than where it informs a more personal context.
This meme is specifically intended as a first-person self-portrait.
It’s not necessarily an academic argument. Think of it this way — sharing a personal story about your imaginary friend is not the same as writing a paper about the psycho-social history of the Imaginary Friend phenomenon — do you understand where I’m making the distinction?
Oh look. Another thread where I want to be notified of comments. I like this plugin.
I think I understand the difference. It’s thealogy/philosophy verses devotion/summoning/imagining.
I’ve done some envisioning with Ms. Money now. She’s nice and homely most of the time - a benevolent sylph or fairy who takes care of me if I participate in my community’s enterprises and don’t ask too much from her. That’s the daily routine between the two of us. We still have plenty of conversations ahead.
But when doing this exercise, I start seeing them everywhere. There’s also Education, Eros, Justice, Family, Art - the Powers that shape our lives. My life in particular. And there are others besides. I could spend all my time talking to these beings. And what if they disagree with each other?
Incidentally, this makes me take the Greek architecture of a courthouse more seriously. Maybe they really do think there’s a deity inside. Or maybe they want me to think so. And then there’s the mall and the different spirits that are invoked their. It gets crazy fast.
Bravo, Rob!
I think you’ve just discovered your personal window into the Pantheon.
Elementals, huh? Faeries? (Ah, THIS is the mischievous twinkle in your eye…)
Now, the Pantheon is populated by Archetypes - these entities are famous - they have a collective history.
Your antenna is extended, man.
The NEXT level of this type of discovery - Who’s right there with you? Who walks beside only you? Some of the entities may reveal themselves to you as Archetypes, Masters, Archangels, deities, elementals… You have an impressive literary, historical warehouse to work with - if you start interviewing these “characters” many of them will come forward for you bearing classical names and costume. They pluck these from us… And they will no doubt adore all that Milton you have laying around…
Are you familiar with Peter Greenaway’s film adaptation of The Tempest - Prospero’s Books?
Well, if you don’t know it yet, you’ll be delighted to find that someone has made a truly amazing film that looks quite a bit like your inner world.
BUT - the personal guardians, the spirit guides - the close personal circle unique to you - they probably won’t be found in books.
Unless you write some and put them there.
The most important entities in your Posse are not famous. They identify with either names that coincide with your own, or names they are most likely to reveal to you alone.
You are surrounded by… something I feel that William Blake would recognize.
PS - I think there’s something much more literal going on with classical statuary than the modern mind remembers.
WAY literal.
Hm. Yes. The Archetypes. Sounds like Frye/Plato/Jung. Especially Plato. In studying the history of Tarot, I’ve learned a bit about Plato and his influence on our society. I’m still thinking through the concept of archetypes and how to relate to them, but it’s definitely a fun imaginative exercise and it looks like a good tool for insight too.
Yeah, the classics are great, but we seem to have a whole lot of modern dieties too. I feel like I can walk around and sense them as easily as find them in old books. Once I made a long list of “power words,” words that make people light up like pinball machines. There’s Heavy Metal and Insurance and Liberation and lots of others too. Incredible the number.
I’m not familiar with that adaptation of The Tempest, though it sounds like I’ll have to check it out. My working-frame for these also comes, to some extent, from a liberal Christian theologian named Walter Wink and his Powers trilogy which is summarized in The Powers That Be. His concern is to redeem oppressive systems of power through non-violent means, but he has a fascinating take on the powers themselves and how people thought about them.
And yes, I’ll look to see if I can find any unique ones floating around in my general vacinity. I think they might show up in story ideas sometimes. We’ll see.
I have found the line between channeled fiction and willful invention is often quite thin.
There IS a difference - but nearly every author has at least one work that they receive in a process they call channeling. You’ll find that description and that actual word “channeled” more often than you might think, and from seemingly conservative sources.
Never forget - the “psychic” parlor trick is secondary to the information you can access. Most people remain intrigued only by the mechanism - the tool is merely a curiosity without dynamic application.
And like any muscle, it can be developed. You may be surprised at what happens - what manifests - when you listen. You “get it” when you test it, and the results are beyond “neato.” When the information you receive can be applied in ways that alter not only your perception, but actually change your life for the better… well, I’m not sure if you step into your stories, or your stories begin to spill into the world.
Both, I guess.
It’s not the technicolor shift of MGM’s Wizard of Oz - one frame - but over time, the accumulated effects…
For me, the results have been that dramatic, miraculous. I can only encourage you to keep engaging, unraveling, peeling back layers.
Your creativity IS your divinity.
You WILL see.
[...] I want to hear about YOUR Money Makeover. [...]
Hey Adam,
Glad you like the plug-in. My general Comments RSS needs a little surgery. When I can get it to validate, I’ll stick it up here as well for all possible options.
Thank you - all you guys - for elevating the Comment threads to relevant!
Slade,
Thanks for the tag.
My thinker is distracted this
week, but I promise to direct it
to this assignment … soon.
xo xo
Deb
“Willful Invention.” That’s a term that I haven’t heard used before, and it certainly is apt. That will require some further thought.
I knew there was a reason why I had to postpone replying to this tag and put my blog on hold.
Wonderful, Deb, there are no deadlines here.
: )
Thank-You Slade, for the wonderful opportunity…
I have completed My Money Makeover Assignment: http://spiritualnewearth.blogspot.com/2007/03/my-money-makeover-old-money-vs-new.html
I decided to make my New Earth Blog Posts more regular, so I waited till Thursday to publish it.
Peace and Love for Humanity,
Jason
[...] Along with all and sundry, I’ve been tagged by Slade of Shift Your Spirits to talk about money — everybody’s favorite topic. Slade’s got a neat twist on it that’s worth exploring: an exercise he picked up from Morgana Rae. Since money is such an abstract concept — for many of us, it simply flows in and out of our lives, and we’re never sure exactly how much we have, or why — he suggests we personify money and establish a relationship with it. Give it a face, give it name, and think about the relationship you have with it. Is it a healthy relationship? Is there plenty of give-and-take? Is Money someone you’d want to take home and meet your mother? [...]
The automated trackback to Druid Journal does not do Jeff’s post a bit of justice — be sure to check it out.
Same with K-L’s, above.
Scrumptious and highly recommended.
[...] Slade has tasked me, as well as several other people, to respond to a tag that he has created. [...]
Here’s mine as well. Sorry that the linkback wasn’t put in right.
http://www.adamspeace.com/blog/2007/03/29/abstracts/
Adam,
Powerful, unique observation. I’m so glad you looked beyond the crowd and the patterns — all of them valid associations — no wrong answers! — BUT it’s cool that you’ve revealed another angle.
More comments to come over at your place.
: )
For all those of you who were tagged and participated in this exercise with me — THANK YOU!
I am going to edit the links for each of your names up there at the end of my post to reflect the actual location of your post (rather than your blog’s homepage).
This has been such a great exercise, Slade. –Wait, what am I saying? This continues to be such a great exercise — I certainly haven’t finished it! Thanks for the inspiration.
You know, as I’ve thought about this exercise, it’s reminded me of the personification of Wisdom in the Biblical book of Proverbs. When a father figure is advising his son to listen to him, he says “Say to wisdom, ‘You are my sister,’ / and call understanding your kinsman;” (7:4). It sounds pretty much just like a figure of speech, except that in the next chapter “Wisdom” starts talking. So this is my footnote along the lines of the one on Bible dipping – apparently Christians and Jews do this stuff too.
Hi Slade,
Just call me slow poke here. Believe it or not I started doing this exercise last week when I received your newsletter. The exercise with money really peeks interest with me.
I am no different than so many out there it seems. And I must admit it is nice to know that I am not alone:)
What took so long you say? Well this is the first time I have ever blogged. And I never knew they were so difficult to set up:) It has taken me this long to just post the first couple of entries.
Thank you so much for allowing me this opportunity to grow and share in the growing.
You can check the completed exercise in the website/blog link. Great one Slade.
Awesome, Sally!
I DID hope you’d participate, but I didn’t know if you had a blog up and running in addition to your main site.
I’m so excited to go read your post, and I’ll add your link up there in the list at the end of the article.
Thank you Slade,
This certainly is an interesting topic. Please bare with me and my blog. It is new territory for me. But I had fun getting it started. Thank you for the challenge. I will get back in here and check out more of the others.
[...] Slade’s blog assignment on Meaningful Money Makeovers has had lots of interesting people writing about what money means to them. [...]
[...] Now it’s your turn: If you want to improve your financial situation, you must first uncover the beliefs that shaped your relationship with Money. Get out some paper and respond to these questions. (Writing creates clarity and speeds your change.) [...]
Hey, all of you who participated in the Money Make-over exercise — we made an impact on the original author of this concept.
Morgana wrote to me last weekend and asked me to share the article she originally wrote. (My article was written after hearing her speak about it.) As far as I know, Morgana doesn’t have a blog, but an old-school ezine.
I think it’s pretty cool that she emailed me, so before we put this Money Thang to rest for a bit, check out how it all got started, in her own words…
Hey Slade,
I’ve posted a blog about my Money Makeover…
The Make Over will indeed be a
work in progress.
XO XO
Deb
[...] Now it’s your turn: If you want to improve your financial situation, you must first uncover the beliefs that shaped your relationship with Money. Get out some paper and respond to these questions. (Writing creates clarity and speeds your change.) [...]
[...] Your Meaningful Money Make-Over [...]
Oh my god I have a freakin’ blog. It’s all your fault, you know, Slade; sending stuff to my mailbox telling me the world needs to hear my voice: so, to answer your request, here is my entry on what Old and New Money look like. It’s my very second post. I have literally been a blogger since this afternoon.
Thalia,
Wow! Congratulations on the new blog — I am very flattered and happy to have inspired you.
[...] * Your Meaningful Money Makeover [...]
[...] new relationship with money Jump to Comments Thanks to Slade Roberson for sharing the concept of impersonating money, I feel inspired to do theexercice he suggested. [...]
Slade,..I recently purchased your Money Meditation Program. After listening to the meditation, I had this thought of a papier mache ball made of all the negative
beliefs about money glued to the outside and the inside is play money or real money, along with stripes of paper with the positive beliefs about money.
At the end of the month long program, celebrate by wacking the ball and allow
the money and positive beliefs to fall in your/my hands. Thanking the Universe
for your/my abundance.