The Lack of Money

J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 0 7 W W W. T I K K U N . O R G T I K K U N 17 JON KRAUSE The Lack of Money by David Loy W hat is money? We use it every day, so we must understand how it works… or do we? Perhaps our familiarity keeps us from appreciating just how strange money actually is. Look at a dollar bill. What is it? A piece of paper. You can’t eat it, ride in it, or sleep on it. In and of itself, it is literally worthless, a nothing. Yet money is also the most valuable thing in the world, because we have collectively agreed to make it so. The anthropologist Weston LaBarre called it a psychosis that has become normal, “an institutionalized dream that everyone is having at once.” And, as we know, that dream always has the potential to turn into a nightmare . The temptation is to sacrifice everything else (our time becomes “labor,” the earth becomes “resources,” etc.) for “pure means.” To some degree that’s necessary, of course. Like it or not, we live in a monetarized world. The danger is that, psychologically, we will reverse means and ends—so that the means become the goal. As Schopenhauer put it, money is abstract happiness; someone who is no longer capable of concrete happiness sets his whole heart on money. Money ends up becoming a “frozen desire”—not a desire for anything in particular, but desire in general. Remember Midas and his golden touch? Nowadays, of course, Midas is socially acceptable—in fact, perhaps there is a bit of him in all of us. Living in a world that emphasizes instant convertibility tends to de-emphasize our senses,infavorofthemagicalnumbersinbankaccounts.Insteadofappreciatingfullythesensuous qualities of a glass of wine, often we are more aware of how much it cost and what that implies about us as sophisticated wine-drinkers. Because we live in a society in which those magical numbers are the most important thing of all, most of us are anxious about having enough money, and much of that anxiety is appropriate . But what is enough, and how do we know the difference between financial planning and abstract happiness? Today money serves at least four functions for us. Because it is indispensable as the mediumofexchange ,ithasalsoevolvedintoour storehouseofvalue.Oncewealthwasmeasuredin cows, granaries, servants, and children, but the advantage of gold and silver—and now bank accounts—isthattheyareincorruptible,atleastinprinciple.Golddoesn’teventarnish.Itis,in effect, immortal. This is quite attractive in a world haunted by impermanence and death. Capitalism added an addictive little twist, which we take for granted today but which was suspicious, not to say immoral, to many people in the past. Capitalism is based on capital— using money to make more money. This third function encouraged an economic dynamism that is really quite extraordinary. The downside is the compulsion to always reinvest whatever we get to get even more, on the assumption that one can never have too much. Psychologically ,ofcourse,thistendstobecome:youcanneverhaveenough.Howmanymealsadaycanyou 6Religion+jumps_final.qxd 6/7/07 10:45 AM Page 17 18 T I K K U N W W W. T I K K U N . O R G J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 0 7 eat?Howmanycarscanyoudrive?Howmuchdoyouneedtoretire?Butcapitalcanalwaysbe used to accumulate more capital. Why do we fall into such obsessions? The anatta “not-Self” teaching of Buddhism implies a special take on our hang-ups with money. The problem isn’t just that I will someday get sick and die. My lack of self right now means that I feel something is wrong with me here and now. I experience the empty hole at the core of my being as a sense of lack, and in response I become preoccupied with projects that I believe will make me feel more “real.” This points to the fourth function of money: it has become our most important “reality symbol,”thebestwaytosecureone’sidentity,tocopewiththegnawingintuitionthatwedonot reallyexist.Suspectingthatoursenseofselfisgroundless,weusedtovisittemplesandchurches to ground ourselves in a relationship with the Divine. Now we open bank accounts and invest in the stock market to ground ourselves economically. Needless to...