When I was in elementary school our teachers would bring us to the uptown library once a week. It was always exciting to get to leave school during regular hours, even if it was just to see more books. Our town library was humble, but it was well curated.

History has always fascinated me, and I would often pick up the large picture books to peruse. I guess I have always been a visual person, and I loved the format of image and description. It allowed me to see with my own eyes what was being written about. I could in a sense experience it.

On one of these occasions I picked up a book, I no longer remember the title, but it was about WWI. I can remember flipping through the pages looking at the pictures showing the true horrors of war. There was a chapter depicting the hyperinflation in Germany after the war. One particular image is still burned into my mind all these years later.

There was an older lady standing in front of a bank with a wheelbarrow piled full of cash. The caption underneath read something like: “Woman withdraws life savings to buy a loaf of bread”, That really struck me. **

Here I was as a small child, being told if I worked hard I could earn lots of money and be very successful. Is this what success was? To have all the money in the world and starve to death? It confused me at the time, and my small child mind soon found other things to wonder about.

Many Years Later

I write this as the Corona pandemic continues to escalate in my country. It has brought out some of the best, and some of the worst behavior humans are capable of, as does any crisis. I hear peoples concerns over the economy, their personal bills and debts, and how they can make ends meet. I relate very personally, these are tricky financial times.

However I know that this is nothing new, history repeats itself. If we can learn any lesson from the past its that money is not what is important right now, people are. In times of hardship it becomes very apparent we cannot buy our way out of a sticky situation. The universe does not recognize the currency of man, there is no set price on our salvation.

Although if you choose, you can help your neighbor, your family, and whoever else might be in need. This is the richest currency we have access too. We are all incredibly wealthy in this way.

We have been trained to think that we cannot survive without money, but it is simply not true. The concept of currency is only about five or ten thousand years old, humanity is thought to have emerged over a million years ago. We have survived far longer without money than we have with. It is a powerful tool no doubt, but it has been misunderstood in so many ways.

Humans actually have very simple needs: nutritious food, clean water, fresh air, and shelter from the elements. So long as we have these things, we can survive, and happily if we choose. That is not to say we cannot enjoy all the luxuries we have access too, but if they should fall away know its not important.

Should things continue to escalate it does not take much of an imagination to see how ugly the potential is. However I suggest we use our imaginations instead to find a better way of doing things. The universe is offering us a profound opportunity to look within ourselves. To question the things we believe are true, question the things we believe are untrue. What do we really know?

Much Love~ Dustin

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**Post script: I did some research to see if I could find the picture of the lady trying to buy bread with all her cash. I did find the picture on a few blogs with similar claims to mine, the most reliable source I could find claims the lady is trying to pay off her mortgage in the 1950’s in Salida Colorado (click here to see). A quick search reveals the bank pictured is indeed in the USA. I guess that is a lesson to why you shouldn’t trust everything you read in history books as fact.

However the lesson learned that day holds true. While the history book I was reading seems to have flubbed, there was indeed a period of time after WWI where the Germans (Wiemar Republic’s) money was worthless. I found what seems to be a trustworthy host of equally powerful images showing how they re-purposed their useless currency (click here to see). Keep in mind their eventual fix to their problem was empowering the Nazi party. I think we all know how that worked out.