The Mental Highway
	The Psychology Of Abundance <  Previous Contents Next  >

The key to abundance lies in your consciousness. The laws of prosperity and economic freedom are specific and we may know and apply them. The same laws, by which inner states come into outer expression, generally apply here. If your consciousness is rich in realization of the spiritual abundance of the universe, you will find that richness moving into abundance of material things.

Probably the crudest thing you can hear a person say is, "I own this." In the literal, absolute sense we cannot own anything. God is the only owner or proprietor. We should never forget that. We are only stewards and custodians of material things.

The impulse toward abundance is perfectly natural. You have seen a dog carrying bones away, a squirrel collecting his supply, or even a bird laying by store, conserving against the future. The desire to be prosperous is a perfectly natural thing.

The desire for abundance is also intelligent, for it provides opportunity to exploit life in its higher phases. If the questions "what shall we eat, drink, and wear" compel any state of civilization to react immediately, it has no time nor inspiration for advance. Yet when they lay up a reserve, and the necessity for reaction is not present, they have time to develop the arts, sciences and philosophies that have made for the world’s advance.

Desire for abundance is a perfectly moral desire, for the principle of justice is universal. The right to secure abundance and provide for the future is not for a favored few, but for the labor force, the lowest and the highest. The only just, economic freedom is that abundance should come to everybody, just as it now comes to comparatively few. The desire is ethical, for no high state of civilization has ever been or will ever be possible apart from some form of individual ownership. For therein lies the incentive to progress, and unless we have that, no progress is permanent.

While individual ownership stimulates competition, and promotes one individual to prominence over others, no one can safely reach a great height who does so at the expense of others. The loneliness of the very rich is an irony of life. When they acquire these riches at the expense of others, immutable law has ordained that moth and rust shall corrupt, thieves break in and steal, and profligate sons squander until the level is reached again. Whenever a family begins to accrue vast wealth, the great leveling process begins to work, balancing up and balancing down. Ancient Egypt towered above all nations in literary, scientific and other achievements, and became a heap of sand.

This observation highlights the fundamental law of economic progress, that cooperation is the only safe principle upon which economic freedom can safely depend. Some of our great industrialists are applying this law in the spirit of cooperation and practical co-partnership with their employees. The spirit of universal fellowship forbids that one should want while another revels and squanders.

Economic freedom rests upon two presumptions, the power to produce, and the right to consume. We have hardly begun to realize the full producing capacity of the sum of human life, yet we are face to face with the fact that millions are in want. The explanation is that we have not solved the problem of equitable distribution of the earth’s abundance, and that is a fundamental factor in economic progress.

Those who raise crops, cut timber or mine for ore are producers. Other producers manufacture them into higher products or usefulness. Still other producers furnish means of transportation and distribution to the needs of millions. The teacher who calls the latent mental powers in the child’s mind into action, and teaches the child how to use them, is a producer of efficient personality. The teacher of religion who calls out the higher and better impulses, furnishing ideals and incentives for better living, is also a producer of the highest quality. All classes and conditions of humanity fall into line with the first law of economic abundance.

The right to consume is based on the fact that we have produced something of equivalent value. Paul said, "He that will not work, neither shall he eat." Every time we give a panhandler a handout, we contribute to his poverty. Every time a person shortchanges another, he cheats himself out of dollars. Bargain hunters steadily impoverish themselves, while those who seek to get something for nothing, will soon have nothing to get nothing with.

This is all based upon the great law of compensation. No one has a right to render a service for which there is no compensation, nor to receive compensation for that which he did not do. To be sure, the compensation may not be of the same kind, but we must never forget the obligation of the law. If you receive a lift on the road by some passing driver, remember that you owe the debt to the next person you find in need of help. Only in this way can you maintain economic self respect.

An eminent lecturer used to say that if you want a million dollars, and know how to use your subconsciousness, you can have it in four years. This statement is generally true, but it needs modification by two principles. The first is that you must have an idea or possession that is worth a million dollars to the world before you can go out and collect its equivalent justly. The second is that you cannot have a million dollars from the world, which the justice of the Eternal Right governs, unless in getting that million you obey the law of compensation, giving value for everything received.

Abundance rests upon the principle of trust. A person who has possessions is the custodian of public resources. Moreover, he may lay aside not only for himself, but he must also lay aside for altruism, to promote the other fellow’s prosperity.

If any of us rest under the illusion that anything is actually our own, please remember that the municipal tax collector has a claim. The county tax collector forces his claim. We cannot forego the State’s demand. The Federal Government claims its right to our possessions in many ways, especially income tax. Nor is the claim on our possessions limited to these. Our own economic safety depends upon making other nations financially safe. When we have done this, a call comes to feed and clothe poor children, or flood, fire and earthquake sufferers. Our prosperity is intimately bound up in the welfare of others.

The secret of abundance lies in one’s consciousness. Jesus said, "A man’s life consists not in the abundance of the things he possesses, but in the consciousness of that which he is." When we reach that realization of abundance within, then obeying the law of all becoming, our inner state moves into outer expression.

The scripture gives the law of prosperity, "Be diligent in business, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord." Here are two counts on the spiritual side to one count on the material side, but the spiritual comes first. It means to hustle, and while hustling, remember that "The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof, the round world and they that dwell therein." In this way you establish a conscious oneness with the source of all abundance, and your thought becomes a channel of inspiration and action for its outward expression. The consciousness of abundance is the secret of abundance. Most poverty of the world arises from poverty of consciousness. It is born of that ancient heresy that there is not enough to go round, and that because the almighty abundance is a little short, some of us should go with less than we need — and this in the face of the fact that when the Infinite Abundance had finished creation, it did not contain a poor house.

Revise your ideas of lack, and fill your mind with the limitless riches of the Infinite. Develop your realization of oneness with the all-life. Realize that you are the open channel through which His life expresses, in which His health glows, where His love manifests, and His abundance rises into unlimited supply.

People are poor because they think poor thoughts, and some become rich when they think rich thoughts — not thoughts about riches, but thoughts of rich, spiritual value. As your consciousness that God is abundance rises, your poverty will cease, just as the realization that He is health will cause your sickness to cease.

Money draws money. Most people think in terms of pennies and nickels, some in terms of dimes, a few in terms of quarters, and occasionally some have enlargement of the heart and think in terms of dollars. If you think of material prosperity as nickels and dimes, you have a nickel and dime consciousness. If you are consciousness of God’s abundance in terms of thousands and millions, it will draw returns in harmony with that consciousness. Enlarge your inner consciousness of prosperity and abundance, and you will get the thing for which it stands.

A person, who gave his last dollar in an offering, received $10 from an almost unheard of source the next day. He gave the $10, expecting another tenfold return, but received one dollar back. He asked why. When he put the one dollar in, he put in $10 worth of riches of thought and consciousness, but when he put the $10 in, he only put in one dollar in faith. Experiences of this kind demonstrate that the law will work.

These experiences are not unique. They merely show that the law still stands. God is the Infinite Abundance, and every idea of His incorporated into material form is for our use, and that Love is the great power that causes us to pass on God’s ideas. He governs by law and order, and all His ideas move with unfailing certainty and regularity. The consciousness of these facts will cure poverty, and bring abundance to everyone.