Choosing Prosperity

Choosing Prosperity

Prosperity is a spiritual attitude and not a material condition; it is a spiritual choice that we make every day. Material wealth can often come between the soul and the Beloved; it (material wealth) can get in the way of seeing the Divine Essence, which created the universe. Material wealth gives one a distorted sense of reality, blinds one to the beauty of nature, to the oneness of humanity and to one’s own spiritual abilities.

Now one might ask what does prosperity and spiritual poetry have in common. The poetry of the mystic speaks of the mystic’s poverty, indeed many mystic poets are poor and bereft of material wealth, but they have an abundance of spiritual wealth. Mystics of all religious backgrounds and cultures know that true wealth comes from the Beloved. They feel the presence of the Divine Essence and know that presence as true wealth or prosperity.

So often, we humans looks at the lack of material things in our lives and despair, because we believe ourselves poor for lack of material items. I am not taking about the necessities (food, shelter, and clothing) here, but rather the extra stuff that a person desires. If you look at the lives of the well know mystics various cultures and religions, they considered absence of the Divine Essence as poverty or lack of wealth. The ancient mystic poets did not worry about food, shelter or clothing, but rather they worried about a relationship with God. For the mystic, in any culture or religion, being without a relationship with the Divine Essence was poverty. You know this by looking at any of their poems or writings, once the mystic had a personal relationship with the Divine Essence then the mystic viewed everything else in a different light, its true light. To the mystic poet his or her relationship with the Divine Essence (God no matter by what name the poet referred God) was prosperity.

Neither reading nor writing mystic poetry leads to a personal relationship with the Divine Essence. Actually, one of the side effects of a personal relationship with God is writing mystic poetry. One achieves personal relations with the Divine Essence through prayer, meditation and reading the sacred writing, the Holy Scriptures. When one has, a personal relationship with the Creator, then on chooses prosperity and eventually one’s entire out look changes.

(17 Mulk 162 B.E.)