Money is as money does

I'm a former money mangager in the stock mkt, managing for money for high net worth investors.

Here's what I've learned:

Money is energy.  That's why it's called a currency.  And that's why it ebbs and flows, because all energy modulates going up and down.

Money is most like the element of water.  Cash flows, pools of captial, streams of income, liquid assets, etc.  Like water, it can generate significant power when channeled in a specific direction.  It can also stagnate and become polluted when it is still for an extended period of time.

Also, like water, when we look at money, we can see our own self-refection.  Fears of scarcity, sense of burden, personal inadequacy or opportunity to play, create, enjoy and receive the abundance of what life offers.

Ultimately, money absorbs the energy we put into it.  Societally, it mostly based in fear and scarcity.  What a great opportunity for us to pour our spiritual and emotional wealth of lvong kindness and wisdom into all our financial endeavors.

I host a weekly radio show , Inside Wealth, that addresses this issue every week.  Zaadz' Brian Johnson graced our radio presence last month.  archives: www.insidewealth.net

Wealth is so much more than money.  As we truly embrace and know in our cells the truth of our one-ness and the power of love and joy, we are free.

And isn't that supposedly what the money is supposed to buy us?  Freedom of choice?

In joy and service,

Stu Zimmerman

Re: Money is as money does

And isn't that supposedly what the money is supposed to buy us?  Freedom of choice?

No

the best-
basho

Re: Money is as money does

Basho -

What do you think money is to be used for?

Re: Money is as money does

Dear Basho -

What do you think money is to be used for?

Re: Money is as money does

I've never thought of the term currency or liquid in that way before. I like how you speak that money ebbs and flows, stagnates or swells. I prefer now to think of money in these terms, they seem emotionally relevant to my own interactions with money over the years. I'm beginning to enjoy my new relationship with currency, I'm even more interested to hear more from your perspective.

If I may ask what do you do now are you still involved with investing? Is your radio show come in podcast form so that we may learn more?

Re: Money is as money does

Money is a social lubricant. It's suppose to help us trade fairly in goods and services. This was good in theory until banks started creating money out of thin air (see fractional lending). Now money is nothing more than fictitious pieces of paper created for the benefit of a small number of powerful groups.

Re: Money is as money does

Money is only a medium of exchange. It is not the wealth. It only presents the future wealth we believe it can provide us in form of goods and services from other people whom we hope to accept our money in an exchange for our desired goods and services.

Wealth is created by people who produce goods and services. We use money as a middle man to satisfy our current and future needs. What we do not consume immediately we can store for later day (save (i.e.invest)). So, yes money can be seen as energy. And like energy it is neither good or bad. It just simply is.

Basically anything can be used as a medium of exchange. History knows many commodities used as money. Currently we have accepted printed paper notes as money that have no other productive use.

Some resources:

http://mowatt.zaadz.com/blog/2007/4/money_as_debt#comment_96809

The Pattern of Indirect Exchange from Man, Economy and State by Rothbard

Sorry for the lenghty quote from Human Action by Ludwig von Mises but I couldn't resist :)
Demand for Money and Supply of Money:

”A medium of exchange is a good which people acquire neither for their own consumption nor for employment in their own production activities, but with the intention of exchanging it at a later date against those goods which they want to use either for consumption or for production.

Money is a medium of exchange. It is the most marketable good which people acquire because they want to offer it in later acts of interpersonal exchange. Money is the thing which serves as the generally accepted and commonly used medium of exchange. This is its only function. All the other functions which people ascribe to money are merely particular aspects of its primary and sole function, that of a medium of exchange.[3]

Media of exchange are economic goods. They are scarce; there is [p. 402] a demand for them. There are on the market people who desire to acquire them and are ready to exchange goods and services against them. Media of exchange have value in exchange. People make sacrifices for their acquisition; they pay “prices” for them. The peculiarity of these prices lies merely in the fact that they cannot be expressed in terms of money. In reference to the vendible goods and services we speak of prices or of money prices. In reference to money we speak of its purchasing power with regard to various vendible goods.

There exists a demand for media of exchange because people want to keep a store of them. Every member of a market society wants to have a definite amount of money in his pocket or box, a cash holding or cash balance of a definite height. Sometimes he wants to keep a larger cash holding, sometimes a smaller; in exceptional cases he may even renounce any cash holding. At any rate, the immense majority of people aim not only to own various vendible goods; they want no less to hold money. Their cash holding is not merely a residuum, an unspent margin of their wealth. It is not an unintentional remainder left over after all intentional acts of buying and selling have been consummated. Its amount is determined by a deliberate demand for cash. And as with all other goods, it is the changes in the relation between demand for and supply of money that bring about changes in the exchange ratio between money and the vendible goods.

Every piece of money is owned by one of the members of the market economy. The transfer of money from the control of one actor into that of another is temporally immediate and continuous. There is no fraction of time in between in which the money is not a part of an individual's or a firm's cash holding, but just in “circulation.”[4] It is unsound to distinguish between circulating and idle money. It is no less faulty to distinguish between circulating money and hoarded money.”

Re: Money is as money does

Hey peter, i love your post. Money really isnt all of the things that we prescribe it as it is just an agreed upon medium which has shape shifted through the ages. Money seems to be the physical thing that we place our intentions with so that we may aquire whatever things we want or need.

This next part may be a bit of a streatch but I'm wondering if it really even means somthing whether or not the money is backed by anything of more value (gold, silver, whatever.)
I saw this documentary about  a tribe that used dog teeth as money, they valued these very highly. Within the context of the tribal community there was no limit to their purchasing power, even more so than livestock. I'm curious to hear the feedback on this.

Re: Money is as money does

The purchasing power is based on the exchange of goods and services between individuals in any society. In another words in order to get something you have to give something. One can do this directly by bartering fish to bread or use a medium of exchange in between. For example buy 'money' by selling the fish and then sell the money and buy the bread.

Provided that the society is based on trust where no one is cheating (i.e. getting something for nothing - stealing) it does not really matter what is used as money. Mises has theoretically proven also that gold, silver etc. were evolved as the commonly accepted medium of exchange by having an alternative productive (i.e. economic = scarce) use first. Later they became the de facto standard 'money'. For example gold can be used for jewelry, semiconductors etc. as well as a medium of exchange.

Our current fiat money is not backed by anything. This means that one can fabricate more money and thus steal/cheat from the society. By printing more paper notes one can exchange those notes to real goods and services (provided that people still believe in the money and are ignorant of the scam) without giving anything back. Thus getting something for nothing. In other words the overall wealth in the society has not increased as a result of printing more paper notes, 'money'. There are no more goods or services for the members of the society to enjoy and consume. (see What Has Government Done to Our Money?)

Alan Greenspan in his article Gold and Economic Freedom in 1967: 

”Money is the common denominator of all economic transactions. It is that commodity which serves as a medium of exchange, is universally acceptable to all participants in an exchange economy as payment for their goods or services, and can, therefore, be used as a standard of market value and as a store of value, i.e., as a means of saving.

The existence of such a commodity is a precondition of a division of labor economy. If men did not have some commodity of objective value which was generally acceptable as money, they would have to resort to primitive barter or be forced to live on self-sufficient farms and forgo the inestimable advantages of specialization. If men had no means to store value, i.e., to save, neither long-range planning nor exchange would be possible.

What medium of exchange will be acceptable to all participants in an economy is not determined arbitrarily. First, the medium of exchange should be durable. In a primitive society of meager wealth, wheat might be sufficiently durable to serve as a medium, since all exchanges would occur only during and immediately after the harvest, leaving no value-surplus to store. But where store-of-value considerations are important, as they are in richer, more civilized societies, the medium of exchange must be a durable commodity, usually a metal. A metal is generally chosen because it is homogeneous and divisible: every unit is the same as every other and it can be blended or formed in any quantity. Precious jewels, for example, are neither homogeneous nor divisible. More important, the commodity chosen as a medium must be a luxury. Human desires for luxuries are unlimited and, therefore, luxury goods are always in demand and will always be acceptable. Wheat is a luxury in underfed civilizations, but not in a prosperous society. Cigarettes ordinarily would not serve as money, but they did in post-World War II Europe where they were considered a luxury. The term “luxury good” implies scarcity and high unit value. Having a high unit value, such a good is easily portable; for instance, an ounce of gold is worth a half-ton of pig iron.

In the early stages of a developing money economy, several media of exchange might be used, since a wide variety of commodities would fulfill the foregoing conditions. However, one of the commodities will gradually displace all others, by being more widely acceptable. Preferences on what to hold as a store of value, will shift to the most widely acceptable commodity, which, in turn, will make it still more acceptable. The shift is progressive until that commodity becomes the sole medium of exchange. The use of a single medium is highly advantageous for the same reasons that a money economy is superior to a barter economy: it makes exchanges possible on an incalculably wider scale.”

Re: Money is as money does

Stu,

I've gotta say I love the way you think!

I find myself surrounded in my everyday life, mostly at work, by people who approach all money issues from a place of lack.  Fear of not having enough tomorrow is the most prominent of all.  So many limits placed upon themselves NOT because they don't have the money but because they don't want to spend the money now because then they won't have it later.  So much talk of financial struggles and worries about the future one could go quite mad listening to it if one was of the mind such as I am that money is meant to be used to bring ourselves joy.  Money in my mind is simply a part of the overall abundance that we are all so very much deserving of.  I work hard for it and deserve to spend it on myself or others as I see fit.  I am not reckless with money and I never blow money simply to blow it.  I have everything I need and more.  I have no desire within me to get more and more just to make myself feel better.  Any of the modern conveniences or luxuries I have obtained are for my personal pleasure to have them…they only are a small part of the joy of being alive.  However all that said material things are not the source of my joy but are simply the icing on the cake of wondeful abundance I have in my life in all things from loved ones to friends to health and so on…

As for myself I am 52 years old and I have no savings, I have no retirement plan, I have really no assets yet I am not worried about my future in the least for I have learned that the affirmation I created for myself almost two years ago is truly all that I need and that affirmation is “We have more money than we need today, tomorrow and always”.

Bravo for you.

Blessings,
Cheryl

Re: Money is as money does

Pete man where do you pull these quotations from, its absolutely incredible. Who knew that Alan Greenspan could break it down like that, what I'm naticing in all of this is that our concepts of money continue to expand as we do, I'm wondering what the money of the future will be.