"The drop in wealth has exposed personal problems....Money---which brought jewelry or extravagant vacations----helped smooth over many of the difficulties," said Kenneth Mueller, a psychotherapist in the East Village who works with many Wall Street bankers and real estate developers. Now, Mueller says, his clients 'catastrophize' smaller bonuses or shriveling stock portfolios. "You have to remind them that there is something that has always been there," he says. "All the money helped mask the anxiety."
----Christine Haughney in the New York Times, It's Not So Easy Being Less Rich, June 1, 2008
Yes. Doesn't all money, drugs, sex and infatuation, alcohol, material stuff mask what was always there? And never goes away until we deal with it, especially by letting God have it?
From today's Redeemer Presbyterian bulletin, New York City.
It's amazing how we need to be reminded of what we know and yet have not thought of in a while. Kenneth Mueller's words remind of reading about the high number of divorces caused by "money problems", when in reality money was merely masking the underlying problems.
ReplyDeleteI read this, today, from VDH:
"As someone who just minutes ago walked out of the jammed-packed Selma Wal-Mart, in the poorest sector of a rather poor Fresno County, I would say a more likely moral failure is a sort of unthinking consumerism, where people buy things they don’t need with money they don’t have. I didn’t see poverty in the store there today, but a real poverty of the spirit, if the contents of the stuffed shopping carts are any indication."
Some Walmart shoppers are doing the same things as some Wall St. Bankers. The only difference is scale.
I must admit, however: just as talking about eating healthy makes me want pie, talking about this makes me want to go out and buy something...
Am reading a wonderful book on materialism verses spiritual worldviews and how drastically it affects our politics (as well as our views of money and consumerism) More on that soon and thanks for the good points, gcotharn.
ReplyDeleteI have so often wished I had the money to comfort myself when the marriage wasn't going as well as it should have been!
ReplyDeleteIf only I could have taken myself to a movie, sat in a Starbucks, gone to visit family. . .but I'd be stuck dealing with the same old stuff all the time.
Providentially that must have been the best thing.
And surely you are stronger, richer for the way things are, Marie.
ReplyDeleteI love the contribution the first commenter interjected here!
ReplyDeleteMy hubby's restaurant is going busy and strong, no sign of business slowing there. We still find it hard to find a parking space in most restaurants we frequent. Yet my neighbor, with a larger home than mine, and new furniture and flat screens through out, is whining about having to tighten her budget!Oh she's an immigrant as well and planning on voting for Barak so he can fix everything. One major complaint is that she is hearing of "free" programs being cut in the public schools but yet Bush is spending so much $$$ on the war.
I guess it would be too mean spirited of me to ask her to go back to her homeland since life is so hard on her here! And what kind of schools do you think her HEALTHY children would attend back in her small, poor country? Come on people, let's give thanks!