Really Looking At It
It’s the start of a new month and I’m looking carefully at where I’ve spent my money–which is to say, where I’ve spent my life energy…because money is really just a way to measure the time and energy I have exchanged for it.
I’ve been keeping a list with separate categories of things I buy over and over. At first, I just listed “groceries.” Then I broke it down into “food” and “household items” (for example: toilet paper and laundry soap). But then I went even further, and now instead of “food,” I’ve made a category to track how much I spend on “Italian mineral water” and “extra dark chocolate.” Believe it or not, these items are a significant portion of my “food” expenditure. (We all have our addictions.)
The idea here is not to make myself feel bad about how much of my income is going for these things. The idea is for me to get clear on what it is that I’m spending my life energy for.
And whether or not I’m getting value for it.
At the moment, I’m not sure.
I may decide that it’s not worth what I’m spending — of myself — on Italian mineral water and extra dark chocolate. Then (I believe) it will be relatively easy to start making different choices. Or I may decide that in fact, I AM getting sufficient value. At which point the received value will actually increase, because I’ll be AWARE of it!
Stay tuned.
(image from GOREY CREATURES by Edward Gorey)