I once heard a very offensive statement by a materialistic person, according to whom no wealthy and successful person ever cries for God; it’s always the losers of life who seek God as some kind of a compensation.
I don’t know where to even begin with this, because it’s untrue in every possible way. First of all, I can cite George Harrison as an example to the contrary. You can probably find a similar percentage of very wealthy and successful people who are deeply concerned over spiritual things, as you can in any other group. The problem is that in every group this percentage seems similar, and tiny.
Which is where we get to my main objection to that silly statement: almost nobody truly cares about God. Sick people desire health. Poor people desire wealth. Old people desire youth. Single people desire an ideal spouse. Unhappily married people desire a way out of their situation. Anonymous people desire fame. Famous people desire peace. Religious people usually desire social recognition and standing that comes from their religious activities. But who desires God? The percentage must be one in a million or less.
And within that percentage, I would bet that all are either in the presence of God, or are going to be.
Just to add something. Lack of money and financial insecurity is so deadly. Especially if you have a family. I don't think scripts and SK (earlier) needed another bullet than that, in many cases, to do serious damage or completely break someone. Someone would have to be terribly strong to get through that. Especially since poverty often causes depression and despair, which further complicates everything.
It's true. Also, it's also a very effective passive way of killing anyone who threatens his system – just turn off money and wait for him to die.
First I thought how this materialistic premise that money solves all problems is inherently false, but then I realised it actually does – for some people.
Then I thought, to whom is this world a solution? Well, it does not look like it is for many considering in what mental state most people are – sure, they think it is and then they chase desires thinking they will find completeness only to end up in an empty pit, consumed. Like flies attracted to sticky sweet trap or attracted to artificial light only to end up in spider web which they did not see in front of that light.
So they thought this world is their home, but they did not realise they are only food.
And only for some this world truly is a solution, a home. I wonder if percentage is similar as those who seek God?
Just the other day I watched this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qfxHfBJ3Mw&t=4486s
And as I watched it, I felt … deeply disturbed, completely opposite of what I feel when I read about worship in your book – just reading about it, turning mind in that direction feels amazing, feels like burst of fulness and completeness, feels "like home", feels like nothing this world has to offer.
But this guy … we could say he "won the game" that he "owns this world". Well, we don't have to say it, we can take his word for it.
He is master manipulator, lord of lies – he completely twisted concept of worship by making it look like it's all about others, that he is so successful because he makes everything about others, all wrapped in thousands of little truths, but it's all one big lie because it is all about him and only him.
This guy is unable to worship, but he seeks to be worshiped.
Which he proved at the end of the video where he admits he would like to live forever which is basically admission that he would gladly sacrifice EVERYONE for himself.
This shithole is his true home.
The concept that worldly success and money solve all problems are something that's usually claimed by poor people looking at the rich people and thinking "if only I were like that, all my dreams would come true".
The thing is, wealth is a spectrum, and by the fact that we're in the West we are basically somewhere in the top half of world population, and if we're having the sort of money that you and I have, we're very likely in the top 1%. Now, the mental experiment. For people below you financially, they see the things you have and think they would be feeling absolute fulfillment if they had them. To you, they all feel… normal. They are the baseline, something that's assumed, it's just here. What you are actually thinking are problems you're having and things you're trying to solve, for instance that mountain of legacy code you're trying to simplify.
Someone very poor looking at you might think that he would be the happiest person in the world were he in your place, but they don't understand what that place look like. They look at your car, your house and everything and they think those things produce automatic happiness. Now we extend that to the absolutely wealthiest people in the world, those with jets and superyachts. It's a very easy experiment because it just assumes a few more things that are normalized; the way you adapt to having a new camera, they adapt to having a new yacht. It comes with people who maintain it and it's like being in a hotel, with a difference that it's your hotel and you also need to manage it. Since it's all normalized, they don't feel anything special about it, and they invent progressively more insane and extravagant things to buy, to give them that "rush" of getting something new and special that will make them happy. But that's just a passing rush, and it solves nothing.
The smart among them soon get bored of this stupid shit and find something useful to do; the foolish ones get addicted to drugs and debauchery and destroy themselves. Basically, the only difference between the richest people and us is that they ran out of illusions about what that next ladder of wealth brings you, and as that happens, they can either keep chasing the dragon, or they shrug, understand that this is merely the scenery, and the important part is something else.
But thinking that rich people don't have a need for God because they have all the fancy things, that's so stupid and naive, only a completely inexperienced and completely poor person could think that. I say completely poor because even as a middle-class person in the West you must understand that you have all sorts of stuff and it all becomes normal and baseline in a week or two.