Build Wealth for Eternity

Spiritual Prosperity

Have you ever stepped into your walk-in closet that is full of clothes and exclaimed, “I have nothing good to wear?” Have you traded a perfectly good vehicle for another, as that is the latest trend? Have you bought a luxurious home in an upscale neighborhood just to keep up with the socioeconomic status? Have you visited the mall with your friends or family just to relax and do some window-shopping?

If you have answered yes to any of those questions, you might be building ephemeral wealth, which leaves you high and dry. Chasing this wealth will bring only misery. Why is that so? It is because no amount of worldly wealth can provide lasting satisfaction or eternal happiness to our senses. Bhagavatam states, the lure of this wealth only inflates the greed:

न जातु कामह् कामानाम् उपभोगेन शाम्यति 
हविषा कृष्ण वर्त्मेव भूय एवाभिवर्धते

na jātu kāmaḥ kāmānām upabhogena śāṁyati
haviṣā kṛṣṇa-vartmeva bhūya evābhivardhate (
Bhāgavatam 9.19.14)

“Fulfilling the desires of the senses does not extinguish them, just as offering oblations of butter in the fire does not extinguish it; instead, it makes the fire blaze even stronger.”

Therefore, instead of spending valuable time chasing this ephemeral wealth, we can use the same time accumulating the eternal wealth, which confers unlimited and everlasting happiness on us. Once attained, this wealth not only transforms our lives, but also the lives of our future generations. We can take it with us when we depart from this world, yet leave it to the posterity. To find out what this wealth is and how to earn it, see the January issue of Samarpan, the monthly e-magazine of Radha Krishna Temple of Dallas.