The History of Worth and Why we Don't Believe We Have It.
Hello Everyone. Hope you are thriving during these times of change.
I have been working a lot recently with the concept of 'worth'. Its another of those words that are bandied about and used for just about everything. What it boils down to when someone asks 'whats it worth' is that they are asking the cost. We have come to believe that worth is about money exchange and status which is defined by money and goods accumulated. That, then, starts to translate into what we see as self-worth and most people don't feel like they have enough of it.
I have always been a student of history and believe that we cannot divorce ourselves from our own and our peoples past. We don't have to be a victim of it, but we do have to acknowledge and learn from it's part in shaping our parents who shaped us, before we could shape ourselves.
As most of us have some part of ourselves that goes back to early Britain, it's as well to look at what happened back then that still affects our own idea and sense of worth. And what happened there did in fact become a world wide trend, either in association with it, or independent of it. Britain, being a fertile island separated from the turmoil of Europe, became a sort after haven and a prize worth having. This started right back with the arrival of the Celts, followed by the Ango-Saxon hordes, the Romans, and the Normans, with a few interventions from the Vikings who made a mess but didn't really settle there en masse. So each wave of invasion created a 'foreign' authority layer that enslaved the locals. Then subsequent invasions continued to put pressure on from the top creating layer and layers of disenfranchised (slaves) people. Hence was the beginning of hierarchy in Britain. Those at the bottom where deprived of their material worth as well as their self worth as they felt they no longer were able to provide for their families or make decisions for themselves but were dependent on the next layer up for everything because they were required to give up everything to them and then ask for it back. Based on that, our forebears lost their sense of self being worth anything in the society that was inflicted on them by might.
And this is pretty much the way our society still operates. We still believe that if we are of the ruling elite we will regain our worth. But there are 99.5% of the population (everyone except you, actually) competing for your place at the top of (or wherever you have been able to get yourself to) the pyramid. This means you can never sleep on the job of becoming 'upwardly mobile' if you buy into this way of being. And we all do on some level. We even manage to turn our spirituality into a one-up-person-ship process with some being more evolved that others and issuing dictum's as to what we need to DO to become elevated. (Remember I am including myself in this ). Hence we all have low self esteem on some level and my practice is full of people seeking a way out of this catch 22 that is literally killing them. And I mean literally. Overwork, worry about what others think or might think if we did this or that, depression about where we are at in our lives, continual encouragement from advertising to purchase and consume and own more things that we are told are 'essential' to our rising out of our current emotional state.
But what we have forgotten with all the invasions (the final one being the invasion of the corporate moguls) is that, even on a scientific basis, we are all part of the raw material of life. Not one part of the Whole can be lost. We are part of it all no matter what shape or species we are currently in the shape of. After all, when we die, the matter that was us just becomes something else; compost, food for the next generation of something. As such we all have what I call 'intrinsic worth' just because we exist. And there isn't anything you can DO to increase or decrease that worth. It just is. Oh Yes, you can earn a million, that's fun if you want to put your time and energy into it. You can be an artist, a parent, a scientist, a beneficiary. Its not going to change your intrinsic worth one iota. You are part of the matter of Everything and that's that. So everything from then on is your choice to spend you time here on because it doesn't really matter. Your worth is already assured. We are just living out a nightmare created by others long ago and perpetuated because nobody stops to think about it. "Do what you will" the magical moto goes, because ultimately we all return to the pot of matter as we arrived in it. And I can hear some of you say, "if we did everything we want life would be chaos". Would it? If we all understood our worth was unassailable, I suggest that we wouldn't feel bad, therefore would not need to get angry. As a result we would have no reason not to be in accord with the Whole. Think about it. When we are OK we can afford to be generous, and we usually are. If we don't, its because we are afraid that by being so we will lose. But lose what?? Our status in society...and around we go again. I could go on about this for pages, but I hope this taste will be enough to set you thinking. YOU ARE WORTH IT!
If you doubt that, come and some sessions with me and we'll see what we can do to change your mind.
Blessings Jay Sparrowhawk Ray
