Are You Ready for Success?

The other day, I was in a small store, standing behind a man buying lottery tickets.

Now, it's not that I hang around all day looking for things to...well, notice, but this was a bit unusual. You see, the man buying lottery tickets was being extremely impolite to the lottery ticket seller. And no, I don't mean that "my perception was that the man buying lottery tickets may have somewhat been potentially unfriendly."

I mean it very clearly and without hesitation: he was being a jerk!

Yes, I know, in the whole self-help world we're supposed to...find the pathology for these kinds of jerk-ish expressions, and therefore seek deeper meaning and all that. And yes, that's a good idea.

But in this case, regardless of what we might learn by deeply exploring the roots and genesis of this lottery ticket-buyer's jerkishness, I'm happily taking a step off to the side and saying: boy, was this guy a jerk!

Specifically, he was being a jerk to the lottery ticket seller (the clerk who worked in the store). The jerk was being caustic, edgy, dismissive, and obviously -- starkly -- impolite.

And since weird things in life tend to make sense to me in ways that even I don't quite understand (and hopefully never will...it's more fun this way :), a thought occurred to me: if this guy actually WINS the lottery, and gets a few million dollars or more, can you imagine what a TOTAL JERK he'd be?

I mean, right now, he has limited "power" because he doesn't have millions of dollars -- so his jerkish orbit is somewhat limited, I would imagine, to the people around his life -- his family, the clerks in the stores that he visits, his co-workers...and so on.

But can you imagine if this guy won a few million bucks? Can you imagine how much larger his jerkdom would be? Instead of affecting dozens of people, he would probably affect hundreds, or maybe thousands of people.

You know -- all else being equal, and assuming (for the purposes of our little blog lesson :) that this wasn't an aberration -- that this guy really behaves like a jerk most of the time -- it's probably better for the world that he doesn't win the lottery. He'd simply spread more misery; he'd use his money, unconsciously of course, to further his misery agenda.

So...

Now let's leave that guy behind and look at all of us here.

Are you ready for the success that you want to experience? It doesn't have to be financial. It can be relationships, health, anything. Is your consciousness ready to accept it; to welcome it?

OR

Like the jerk buying the lottery tickets, are you simply demonstrating, in your "ordinary actions," that you aren't ready at all? That, in fact, you are far too immature -- far too unconscious -- to truly embrace, value and handle the success that you so deeply want to experience?

It's said that when the student is ready, the teacher appears.

Don't wait for your external life to change before you "change yourself" -- IT DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY. You will not change yourself; trust me. You may think that you'll be the exception -- that you'll be the "generous millionaire" but you won't. Most generous millionaires aren't generous at all; they've just shifted their egotistical needs from the gross (physical money) to the subtle (buying a first class seat in heaven). It's just the same stupid ego game played in different ways.

Change yourself FIRST. Do you want wealth? Then you must increase your wealth consciousness; and you cannot wait until you're wealthy to do this.

You cannot learn to swim after you've been thrown in the water. Learn to swim NOW, and then have no fear when you end up in the deep end.

Most lottery winners actually lose their winnings within two years.

It's because they didn't have wealth consciousness first.