Abundance

November 13, 2023

Instead of instructing us to achieve financial prosperity, Rabbi Jesus tells us how to fill ourselves with the life force. When we receive overflowing love, energy, contentment, enthusiasm and peacefulness, we receive the life force. Of course, we are conduits of this force in our ego state, but once we’re aware of the life force Jesus asked us to seek, to knock for and to thirst for, we have a more abundant life force than the ego alone could ever create.

It is possible because the Rabbi teaches us how to peel away the unhealthy ego ... the part of the ego that swells us with pride, creates hubris over our accomplishments, inflates our significance, makes sure its story comes true, and confuses the abundant life with financial prosperity.

The beatitude most coherent with this concept is, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5:3). Rabbi Jesus is not referring to the Holy Spirit in this blessing. Instead, he means being empty of the unhealthy ego's spirit of self-preoccupation. Only by being poor in our unhealthy ego's spirit can we have real abundance: the kingdom.

These concepts sound like "pie in the sky by and by" for many of us who have been instructed to "Deny yourself!" all our lives. OK, so we deny our ego; what do we do then, walk around in robes singing hymns? Realistically, who will we be if we shed our ego's spirit?

Regardless of the seemingly impossible prospect of achieving Rabbi Jesus's consciousness, the truths he spoke are the most profound truths of human existence. So, when they are applied, we gradually grow into an abundant life. The truths teach us who we will be when we shed our ego.

The Enneagram reflects Rabbi Jesus's wisdom by showing us that our soul is our real identity. Our original goodness, our soul child, our core being, is who we really are. The Enneagram maps out how to get there and even gives us the characteristics of our soul when we arrive. It echoes Jesus's truth that our essence’s unbreakable link to the Divine is the way to abundant life. Therefore, we don't fight the ego, instead we find something better - something absolutely wonderful that we lost touch with long ago.

Inquiry: Are you prosperous?

Dear God,

Your words echo in my heart: "What does it profit us to gain the whole world but lose our souls? Nothing is more important than our souls and the souls of those we love and influence. Grant me the abundant life of the soul, dear God. Amen.

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