Photo: Colourbox.

Why do we work at all?

Once I was at a job interview at the furniture sale Ikea. On that occasion, a young woman in a blue T-shirt interviewed me.

"Why do you want to work at Ikea?" she asked.

"I've found that Ikea pays its employees more than other chain stores," I replied.

She then said that “Salary is a matter of course. What can you offer us that will make us an even better company?”

I was not prepared for that question.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

It's a question that is only asked in societies where basic needs are being met. We have, so to speak, already moved up from a state where life is about mere personal or family survival, as it is known from Maslow's pyramid of needs.

It gives reason to also consider how money is made in business. In certain parts of the business world, the black numbers on the bottom line are given an almost absolute importance.

The greater profit, the better – and that even when a person watching the company from the outside would think the existential needs of the company and its employees are being met. For some companies, it seems as if making a lot of money is a goal in itself – and this even to such an extent that the company's owners, board and management might overlook or forget other needs of customers, employees and the surrounding community.

It seems in a way as if the owners are not really satisfied by money itself; that they are suffering from an inner lack that they try to fill by earning even more money. And it seems as they make other people work for them, because they cannot do enough work themselves to meet their own needs – however, they do have the power and means to make others work for them. They continue almost until they – as by force – pass out or end up in hospital. Here they have the opportunity to reorient themselves in life – withdrawn from the daily hectic and busy life of making money – that is, almost as being on a spiritual retreat – although involuntarily.

"Yes, the planet got destroyed. But for a
beautiful moment in time we created
a lot of value for shareholders."

If business life continues in this way, only looking at their companies' and shareholders' own needs without awareness of and alignment to the larger whole that the managers and the company are part of, we may risk endangering the very foundation of life on this planet. With quarterly accounts for many major companies, a very large emphasis is placed on generating profits for shareholders every quarter. Actually, corporate management can be financially rewarded for continually increasing the company's share price and dividends to shareholders. This is called shareholder value.

On a personal level, this problem is also known in various forms of overconsumption / overintake. For example, if you have gotten into the habit of consuming more food than your body actually needs for the life you lead. In some countries, more than half of their population is obese. In comparison, a developing country like Indi have more than 200 million obese people. That is about the number of overweight people in the United States of America. This means that many people are, in a way, eating for more than one person. Some persons' portion sizes for meals may be equivalent to 2 or 3 people. It eats into the earth's resources in terms of agricultural production of food and farm animal feed. More than 60 percent of the arable land on the globe is used for growing feed for these animals. Unfortunately, many people love eating meat more than they love eating vegetables.

What exactly is the problem?

People were created to be loved.

Things were created to be used.

The reason why the world is in chaos,

is because things are being loved,

and people are being used.

— Martin Buber.

A part of the population seems to suffer from deficiencies that it tries to compensate for in other ways – ways that will never be able to meet the real underlying needs.

So it can be said that not all of us have an eye on our real needs, but frantically try to have them met in alternative ways, as suggested by influential forces and ideas in society with perhaps an excessive emphasis on making money resulting in a very large workload for the individual.

The individual becomes – by starting a family – largely bound by work, because a lot of money must be earned over the years to pay mortgage for a house, a car, and the family's daily large consumption. When you take out a mortgage, you have to work a lot to pay it back – it is experienced as a sacrifice and surrender – and perhaps even a kind of slavery or drudgery.

Each one of us may have our own physical, emotional, or mental problems that make it difficult to nurture good relationships with our loved ones and others.

Thus, one is in a state of constant lack (the not yet fully paid mortgage), on which one spends a lot of energy – perhaps the best part of one's energy and time – energy and time that, for some, might have been used for a more worthy cause.

How can the problem be solved?

Many people believe that their problems can be solved politically. They think it is a matter of the leaders of the country taking the right and necessary decisions at the right time to change the situation.

You've probably also noticed that it's really difficult to make decisions and then implement them. Perhaps there doesn't really seem to be enough resources and time in the community to solve the problems in time.

But we are not alone on this planet. And our problems cannot be solved by humanity alone. We have to go to the altar and appeal to powers greater than those we immediately know in order for the venture to succeed at all. And sometimes the solution is very different from what we think.

Moreover, there are many aspects of these things which are not known at all among men. Why do these things happen? Why do we have these problems?

Is it in fact old personal and collective karma that, according to a cosmic timetable, is due here at the transition to the Age of Aquarius? Perhaps we cannot take the old ways of feeling and thinking into the new age, which requires a completely different attitude than before.

When we have these needs that we chase without actually having them met, is it because we are in error or blind to the underlying causes and what it takes to resolve them? We must sacrifice, surrender, and leave the old ways, perceptions, and opinions which no longer serve us, behind us, and see what emerges.

There are spiritual means which make it possible for the individual to contribute to the solution of the problems to a much greater extent. The spiritual hierarchy that governs this planet has given disciples of the ascended masters and other great beings of the Great White Brotherhood the means to be an active part of the solution, so that they themselves have an easier time on earth, and through sacrifice, service, selflessness, and surrender to Christ and God, and achieve mastery of the seven rays, purity, freedom, peace, love, kindness, attainment and deep spiritual insight and knowing.

This is not to say that not all people are already involved in the great plan for this planetary home and its dwellers, but simply that an active participation in the transition to the new age makes it easier and less painful for the individual than to be in opposition to and fight against the changes that will come anyway.

For example, when you are developing a greater capacity for love, kindness, compassion and mercy, you may contribute enormously to both increasing your own well-being and improving your relationship with others. This not only affects you, but can create changes in many other people and institutions in society – known or unknown to you.

Which choice should I make? To the left or to the right?

Which way should I go? To the left or to the right? Photo: Colourbox.

The golden rule

"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

This rule of life is found in all the world's religions in one form or another.

If you are able to increasingly live by this rule, in a positive way, you will find that your surroundings begin to behave differently towards you. Every time you have to choose between a lower choice (which you may have made so many times before) or a higher choice (which you stopped doing at some point), you have the opportunity of a more positive future. If you choose the higher path, the past no longer needs to repeat itself. Something new can happen.

In the present, you will experience that other people meet you in a positive way to a greater extent than before. You may even discover that the reason other people behaved badly towards you before was because you yourself thought, felt, spoke and acted badly towards others. You only received what you sent out in the past. You have accepted their negativity, which in a way actually was your own. You therefore no longer need to hold a grudge against others, because you yourself were the source of it.

The teachings of the Ascended Masters as given through the messengers of the Summit Lighthouse

Translated books from the spiritual organization Summit Lighthouse, written by the spiritually gifted leader Elizabeth Clare Prophet about the teachings of the Ascended Masters, and published in Danish via Forlaget Clare. In English, they are published by Summit University Press and may be found in brick-and-morter book stores as well as online stores.

Translated books from the spiritual organization The Summit Lighthouse, written by the spiritual leader Elizabeth Clare Prophet and published by Forlaget Clare. The books have already been translated into a number of languages.

Invoke the violet flame, which the ascended masters El Morya and Saint Germain has been allowed to make available to us, for the transmutation of personal as well as planetary karma, which is part of the solution here in the transition to the Aquarian Age.

Most of us have old negative karma from past lives over the millennia. Here, at the transition to the Age of Aquarius, there is an extraordinary opportunity to balance this karma and make the most of it. In the book "9 cats with 9 lives", you can read about 9 past lives of each of 9 famous people from the twentieth century. First published in English via the spiritual organization Summit Lighthouse and written by the spiritual leader Elizabeth Clare Prophet, and now published in Danish by Forlaget Clare.