a small, strange epiphany
i have a friend who has strong opinions regarding american "free enterprise" and the concept of "the man." his passionate stance always makes me smile and i am often filled with inquistive-ness, curious to more fully understand why he holds his views on american businesses.
as the daughter of a fairly successful businessman, raised in upper-middle class american suburbia, living off of starbuck's lattes and einstein's bagels, it is hard for me to fully appreciate the inherent evil in the large corporations that i consider "home." so yesterday was a trip back to reality as i experienced a little bit of the joy that perhaps my friend so passionately believes in.
as i finally begin to grow-up and take hold of life for myself, as a young adult trying to figure out how i am going to sustain myself through this crazy life, i am finally faced with the decision to choose for myself what i consider to be a reasonable means of income and how much it really is going to cost me to survive ;o)
the crazy realization...not as much as i thought!
i always assumed that i would need tens of thousands of dollars rolling in every year just to make ends meet, but the cool thing is we can live off of a lot less than that and the scary truth is that we probably should be living off of a lot less than that!
my friend told me that rich mullins used to donate 90% of his income to the church and live off of the remaining 10%...even for a successful musician that is a pretty modest budget to live with! but he did it and i am realizing i can too!
what a joy to realize that i have been stressing over money just because i never realized how little i need it! :o)
as the daughter of a fairly successful businessman, raised in upper-middle class american suburbia, living off of starbuck's lattes and einstein's bagels, it is hard for me to fully appreciate the inherent evil in the large corporations that i consider "home." so yesterday was a trip back to reality as i experienced a little bit of the joy that perhaps my friend so passionately believes in.
as i finally begin to grow-up and take hold of life for myself, as a young adult trying to figure out how i am going to sustain myself through this crazy life, i am finally faced with the decision to choose for myself what i consider to be a reasonable means of income and how much it really is going to cost me to survive ;o)
the crazy realization...not as much as i thought!
i always assumed that i would need tens of thousands of dollars rolling in every year just to make ends meet, but the cool thing is we can live off of a lot less than that and the scary truth is that we probably should be living off of a lot less than that!
my friend told me that rich mullins used to donate 90% of his income to the church and live off of the remaining 10%...even for a successful musician that is a pretty modest budget to live with! but he did it and i am realizing i can too!
what a joy to realize that i have been stressing over money just because i never realized how little i need it! :o)
posted by r.m. @ 3:09 PM
1 Comments:
At 8:50 AM, March 10, 2005,
kathy said…
I come from the same background and have the same struggle trying to understand our economic structure from a different point of view.
I can't remember where I read this - must have been on a blog - but it's interesting how in the OT, God commanded the Israelites to celebrate the Year of Jubilee when all debts were cancelled. And in the NT, the first Christians made sure each other's needs were met.
When you boil down the "free enterprise" system, it's borrowing. It seems to be the opposite of what the Bible says about taking care of each other and having enough.
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