posted by wtanaka at
6/18/2003 11:02:00 AM
Sunday, June 15, 2003
While visiting India, I lived for over a week with a monk that I befriended at the airport. During my time with him, I learned that he wanted to start up a "center for the poor" in southern India. Of course, building a "center for the poor" requires money. To raise that money, my friend was considering recording an album of Tibetan and Nepalese songs that he sang.
His ambition impressed me. I realized why when I visited the Dharma center where he was teaching English. Written on a piece of typing paper above the map of the world on the wall was written, "What do I want to do with this precious human incarnation I have been blessed with?"
I realized that we all have N years of time on this earth, and that we make choices every day which affect how we are going to be spending those N years. At the end of my life, I do not want to judge my life based on how much money I have, but rather what I have accomplished and possibly how good of a person I was.
Of course, I realize that money is important. Without any money, I would be forced to work for some company right now just to make sure that I had a place to live and food to eat. But after some point, getting more money just isn't all that useful in most cases.
One thing I really need to do is figure out how much money I want to earn to take care of all of the things that I think I might need to take care of in life. Then I'll know when I can retire (or conversely, how much more money I need to earn before I can retire)
