Let’s talk about something that all of us are guilty of at some point or another. Greed. It is easy to sneak in and hard to get rid of. Remember Gordon Gekko from the famous movie Wall Street? He glorified Greed. I remember the dialog which goes Greed is Good.
Greed has sipped into our society so much that no one thinks it is bad anymore. We put greedy people on a pedestal and give them the highest of regards. Our best and brightest want to work for wall street and law firms as opposed to go invent the next best thing or cure cancer or help humanity.
We live in a society where everyone is fleshing their possessions on social media like it is some type of competition. When did living become an Olympic sport? We all are chasing this elusive dream that if only we had a little more we would be just fine. Growing up I heard this story that I am sure you all may have heard it. There is this guy who goes to the King. He says, I am measurable and I would like to live comfortably. King was generous so he said fine, I will give you a piece of land. The guy said how big? The King goes, as much as you can take. You start when the sun rises at a specific point. You start walking. The only condition is that you must come back to the same point before the sunsets. All the land you cover during that time is yours forever. The guy was really excited. He was all ready to go come sunrise. He started walking. He was covering good ground. By the lunchtime came about, he thought of stopping for lunch but told himself he could skip lunch one day. The more time he spent walking, the more land he would get. So he keeps walking. By around 2 pm he was really tired. He slowed down. But he did want to stop. He thought he should start walking towards the original point but decided to continue instead to make sure he could cover more ground. He keeps walking and all of a sudden it is 4 pm. Now it is really getting late. So he began to walk back towards the original point. He realized he may not make it back so he started to run. He kept running it was a few minutes before sunset. He could see the origin point. It was all within his grasp. He was going to be rich with all this land in his name. But he was tired. He could not even walk let alone run. He was dragging himself. Out of energy. As the sun was going down, he fell down and stretched his hand. He was maybe a foot short and the sunset. He could not make it. He died on the spot. All he needed was six feet of land for his burial. Greed made him lose his life.
Why do we become greedy? Greed comes from our burning desire for something. We get greedy because we think those things will provide us long-lasting happiness. But the goalpost keeps moving. What you think would give you long-lasting happiness keeps changing with every passing moment. Once we achieve what we set out to achieve, we may get temporary satisfaction but not lasting happiness. Our goals will change again and we will start chasing again. Greedy people are never content with what they have. Greed also shows up as a lack of generosity and compassion towards others.
Let me give you an example. I am sure you have heard this animal rescue advertisement on TV with Sarah Mclaughlin’s song in the background. I was in a seminar with the guy who started that foundation. He has since passed. He told me he was so smart that he started this non-profit foundation and he had his own business that had a contract with the non-profit to provide T-Shirts and other things to non-profit at an inflated price. He thought he was a genius taking money from people in the name of charity and benefiting himself. When that becomes a badge of honor, something is wrong with our society.
Let me give you another example. Someone called me up recently about some advice. I asked him what he was trying to achieve. He said his goal was to make $8,000 per day. So I asked him a few questions and realized that he was making a decent living. So I told him, why he was putting so much pressure on himself when he was making a decent living and most people would love to be in his situation. I said why not enjoy the remaining time he had with his family rather than chasing this elusive $8,000 per day goal. He said my wife and parents are saying the same thing. I was like, maybe you should listen to her! Anyway, towards the end, I suggested that he should not chase this and just be happy with what he had. So he said, Nirav, I can teach you how to make $8,000 per day! See, he did not listen to a word I was saying. Here I was trying to get him off this drug called greed and he was trying to get me hooked!
It is very difficult to get rid of greed. But fortunately, there is hope. The antidote to Greed is Generosity. More generous we are – with our possessions, our time, etc.; less greedy we will be. We have talked about generosity in the past. I strongly suggest you go back and read the generosity blog or the generosity video on our YouTube channel.