Greed builds greed, money chases money, dopamine chases dopamine. I met the man tonight I’ve talked about for a long time, the posited drug-addicted rich boy child of a legacy family. I'm lucky to have booked this hostel because tonight I saw what it looks like to have unceasing desire. He had just fled his previous country. He fled with 700K in corporate debt whilst running away from drug habits and running towards the imagined dream of a family. He said there was no luck that he was born to a rich family and to be fair this was the only thing we agreed on. He was privileged to be brought up amongst wealth but not lucky I felt. He lacked fortune to be born to his gilded surroundings, surroundings that on his own accord praise three great virtues: God, Glory and The Family Legacy. Here I found this Family Legacy drunk on his hostel bunk, coming down from a cocaine binged Wednesday night of paid dopamine and paid sex.
He was a man of God he told me, just not a practicing one. He was upper class British in accent and American Christian Free Marketeer in nature. He told me as he’d gotten closer to God, he had found happiness. Yet he never espoused the moral ethics of humbleness, humbleness he told me was what poor people told themselves to stay happy being poor, he said sipping his corona.
He could stay in a penthouse suite in a hotel, yet he stayed at the hostels as they helped to stay grounded between his binges. When I asked if his hunger fueled his appetite even more, he told me yes it did. He told how he envied his friend who was satisfied sailing alone on his boat, his friend who didn’t crave money and instead managed to find himself simply content.
He credited himself for the livelihoods of his employees saying his actions provided them with over 200 salaries, while never stating the fact that 200 working employees also provided him with a salary. A salary that would pay for his lawyers, his fast cars and even his helicopter rides when his licence was revoked for speeding 100 km over the limit.
We talked capitalism, we talked socialism and somewhere we got into the weeds of what an economy should indeed look like. He asked me was it fair that he’d put in all his hard work, after he’d received the McClaren, the Penthouse sweet, the fixed wing-aircraft , he asked me if it was fair that he’d lost relationships, he’d lost his company, he’d had to stare the barrel of a gun, was this all fair?
Fair is a funny word isn’t it. It doesn’t have the same legal bravado that justice has, or the same inalienable quality as prescribed rights, fair is a unique one. In this case the way he was using the word “fair” was to ask what should've happened? I can’t say if what he was describing indeed should have happened, but indeed it did happen, he chased his lust till it pushed him back to the other side of Earth. He consumed everything till his gluttony overwhelmed him and he found himself stewing in his own self-pity.
When I asked him if money made him feel happy?
“define happy?” he asked, “fulfilled” I said,
“define fulfilled” he replied, “feeling satisfied” I answered,
“No one can ever feel truly satisfied,” he concluded.
He told me he couldn’t meditate. For him the 30 minutes a day made no sense if the other 23 and a half are wild and frenetic. This is a thought that had on his own accord only for it to be confirmed and reiterated in one of his favourite podcasts. Meditating was both unachievable and unneeded in his life. Yet it’s often the things you feel like you don’t need that you often require the most.
He is a child of his own privileged trauma, a human who can and will pursue their own financial success through non-stop self-sacrifice. Moving to Monaco was his next stop, a location picked for their low taxes and safe neighborhoods. His new God driven direction in life was to provide financially for the family to sow the seeds for future generations, preserving his and families name and legacy. He was yet to find his partner or yet to have his children, yet sure enough in the end the family name will pass on and his own legacy will be extended.
When I dream of a family that brings me fulfilment I don’t dream of legacies, I dream instead of leaning back to the large wooden table that presides in front of me, relaxing quietly while I appreciate the people I love surrounding and showing love for each other. You will never live to see your legacy, but you can live to see and enjoy the immediate moment, only if you pause and breathe for it. I'd recommend 30 minutes a day.
Image :
Greed, British Museum, New Hollstein (Dutch & Flemish) / The New Hollstein: Dutch and Flemish etchings, engravings and woodcuts 1450-1700 (24.I), Accessed on 26th January 2023, <https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1880-0710-642>
No comments:
Post a Comment