What would you do if you found a wallet that had $1600 in it? This was a question posed by someone in a meeting I went to recently where several people responded there in saying they would take the money and throw the wallet away in the garbage.
While I can’t say that’s what I’d do today if I was the one who found it, I must admit there were times before I ever worked on my recovery from addiction and before I ever worked on my spiritual condition that I would have done the very same thing.
Thankfully, I’ve grown a lot since then in both my recovery and my spiritual condition to know that karma usually comes back around. Maybe that’s why I lost a wallet more than once already in this lifetime and had to go through the frustrations of losing whatever money was in them, getting a new license, cancelling credit cards and having various identifications resent to me.
I’ve also often heard that when money is gained in dishonest ways that karma generally comes back around three times worse. So that $1600 that suddenly feels so great in one’s pocket could turn into over $5000 of medical bills sometime later. Or maybe a huge car accident where one’s vehicle is totaled takes place not too far down the road? Or maybe something else altogether happens to the person in the near future where they incur a big financial toll. I’ve seen this very thing happen to me throughout life whenever I’ve gained money that wasn’t meant for me.
Nevertheless, I will say that today I would feel nothing but guilt if I took the money from the wallet and then threw it away. It just wouldn’t work with my spiritual principles. So what would I do then if I found a wallet with that large amount of money in it. I would do everything I could to identify who the owner was and try to locate them. And if I couldn’t, I’d most likely take it to the closest police station, hoping they would find its owner somehow.
Regardless, I know how easy it would be for the ego to be excited about having $1600 unexpectedly. But walking a spiritual path isn’t easy and making decisions for our highest good usually aren’t very easy either. The ego always tries to get involved rationalizing about how it needs the money to do this or that. Yet I tend to believe that my Higher Power is constantly watching me to see if I choose the road less travelled and in this case I definitely would.
I’m a lot better at choosing the road less travelled these days and money doesn’t rule my life anymore either. That’s why I know I’d do the thing that God would want me to do if I found a wallet one day with $1600 in it. And hopefully you too would do the same and not let your ego convince you otherwise if it should ever happen to you…
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson