Ways to Reduce our Greediness

In the Catholic Peace Weekly column Believer's Platform, the writer working as a counselor meets a lot of people having a hard time and tries to help them be less harassed dealing with their problems. 

Most people deal with different problems but in his experience, one of the most common issues is excessive covetousness. 

A rich man repeatedly raised a finger desperately on his death bed. "If he made just a little bit more he would have made 10 billion." The death of a rich man who couldn't give up his greed for money caused his listeners to feel more than sadness but rather a sense of shame.

As a result, he often wondered if there was a way to reduce excessive greed. Greed is the desire to have more than one has. Many people try to get closer to what they want by increasing what they have. But there is no end to what you want, so you want more when you get to the level you want. The first way to reduce greed is to reduce what you want. The way to reduce it is simple: Is this really necessary? When you want to buy something, you can reduce your greed by making a habit of asking if it is necessary now. The next question is: Is there anything more important than this? Finding something really valuable to be greedy for is good medicine to reduce one's greed.

While teaching counseling to religious workers this semester, they had time to share how they became a member of their community. They went to a good university, got a good job, but, Is this really everything? "Isn't there anything more important in life?" The message that he heard was to have greed for what was more important than money, honor, and status. These values disappeared naturally as they looked for something more important in life.

One religious sister's motivation was special. The nun said that the reason she became a nun was "only to live." No matter what conditions or positions living is the most important thing, and she learned that God wants life to vibrate with energy. She was called to live fully, not only rightly. She is learning the wisdom of seeing the sky, and the earth and seeing all with a penetrating eye.

 

Through Sister, he realized we really need to be covetous for all of life. He realized that being alive as a person is the most precious thing, not a life that becomes something and has something, and that I should be happy and help others to enjoy life. 

 

When we know that what we need is a need to live life fully: a mysterious inner experience in which neither our excessive greed for our children's success nor our desire for excessive change in our spouse will continue to bother us greatly. A life with less greed is the happiest life.