Meditation: Fortune and Fame

As with most blogs of this type, let’s begin with some definitions. Fortune is defined as a large amount of money or assets. We are not talking about the luck definition. Fame is defined as the condition of being known or talked about by many people, especially on account of notable achievements. I don’t know if everybody that becomes famous, has what is known as achievements, but I will accept the definition, just to move along. Some people become famous for breaking the law, and others become famous, simply by making an extreme amount of money. That can certainly be considered an achievement, but it is not the same as an athletic, or scientific achievement. Fortune and fame do not always go hand in hand. There are lots of wealthy people, who are not famous. By the same token there are famous people, who are not wealthy. Fame can have it’s obvious drawbacks. The worst thing about being famous, is that everything you do, is seen under a microscope and everybody seems to know about it. I think what it all boils down to is, there is a price to pay for being well known. When the famous develop problems of addiction, depression, run ins with the law, and general bad behavior, although not excusable, it can be understood, why these things can happen. The solution can be simple. Just stop doing what made you, and is making you famous. It is a sacrifice, and it may seem unfair, but it is a solution to the problem. It seems even the wealthy and not so famous are not all that happy, and some can be pretty miserable. When we hear about this, we often wonder, how somebody with all that money, can have so many problems, and be that unhappy. All the wealthy are not like this, but there are enough, that there are many articles in many journals written about this subject. Here is a short review on the general consensus, of why the wealthy are unhappy.

First, here are some quick stats. There are close to 800 billionaires in the United States. Here are the top 4. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg, all have a net worth between 105 and 188 billion dollars. Sweden’s richest man, Stefan Persson, is worth 18 billion which would just slip him in to the top 25 in the United States. Millionaires are a totally different story. There are well over 18 million of them and just over 75% of them are white. Apparently being a millionaire is not really all that great. Even the titles of some of the articles are ominous. The dark reasons so many rich people are miserable human beings. Then the article goes on to discuss people that are making a little over 100,000 dollars a year. That’s not rich, when compared to the millionaires and billionaires. There is an article, simply titled, why aren’t millionaires happier. That article talks about people knowing, that material things can not buy them happiness. It’s also hard to stop buying, once you start, but people with lesser incomes, seem to have that problem, also. Millionaires do not seem to be immune to having fairly high suicide rates, compared to other sectors of society. When compared with the other wealthy countries, it seems one of the wealthiest, the United States is also the leader in suicide rates. Reading these articles, even though they create a certain amount of sadness, do not give a good reason, why there is so much despair among the wealthy. I have my own theory.

It really boils down to not knowing, what to do with all that money. A lot of billionaires and multi millionaires do a lot of philanthropic work, and help a lot of people. They are all set up through some foundation, so even though a wealthy or famous person’s name is attached to it, it is the foundation doing the work, with a lot of people volunteering, and donating money. I think what the very rich need to do, to end all their misery, is to help people on a 1 to 1 basis. The 800 or so billionaires could give away 1 billion dollars each, in increments of 100,000 thousand dollars, to the poor and needy, directly. They could go down to the border right now, and give that amount to everyone crossing the border. They could walk into homeless shelters, and give each person there, 100,000 thousand dollars. There is approximately 5000 Americans with a net worth of over 100 million dollars. All of those Americans could give 1 million dollars each, in increments of 100,000 directly to the needy and poor. Just get the money, make a bank check made out to cash, and start passing them out directly. Don’t worry about tax breaks, and write offs, just go out and start giving that money away. You have plenty of it. If you have a foundation, it will be fine and will continue the good work that it is doing. For those of you under the 100 million mark, give what you can, but give it directly to the person. In order to be a happy billionaire, or multi-millionaire, you have to have that feeling of the one on one gift. It makes everyone feel good, and you get to do it many times. So just do it, all you millionaires and billionaires, and you are not going to feel miserable any more. It will give you a whole new feeling.