One of my favorite stories comes from The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle.
A beggar had been sitting by the side of a road for over thirty years. One day a stranger walked by.
“Spare some change?” the beggar asked, mechanically holding out his cap.
“I have nothing to give you,” the stranger replied. Then he paused and asked, “What’s that you are sitting on?”
“Nothing,” said the beggar. “Just an old box. I have been sitting on it for as long as I can remember.”
“Ever looked inside?”
“No. What’s the point? There’s nothing in there.”
“Have a look inside,” the stranger insisted.
So the beggar pried open the lid.
With astonishment, disbelief, and elation, he discovered the box was filled with gold.
For three decades he had been sitting on wealth he never thought to examine.
A big part of my work is helping people engineer perspectives that show them how blessed they already are. So many of us are winning and yet since we don’t stop to count and feel our blessings, it’s as if they don’t exist
That’s why the story of the beggar on the box is one of my favorites. It exposes something most people miss. Many of us are already sitting on a life filled with gold.
One of the places this comes to life is inside the My Freed Life two-day session. I walk the room through an exercise I call the Three Perspectives. I did not create it, but I have refined it over the years, and it has become one of the fastest ways I know to help someone recognize what truly matters and, just as importantly, what doesn’t.
I start with a simple question.
“If I offered you $100 million for your business, and there was no small print, meaning you could open the exact same business next door tomorrow morning, would you take it?”
Most people answer immediately. Yes.
Then I change the terms.
“Ok same scenario, you get the $100 million, but you only have the time between the wire hitting your account and going to sleep tonight. You will not wake up tomorrow. Would you take the $100 million?”
“No”
“So waking up tomorrow morning is worth more than $100 million to you. Are you treating it that way?”
Then we go a little further.
“You get the $100 million and a long life, but you never feel good again. You wake up every day with a headache, nausea, and a low-grade fever. Want the $100 million?”
“No”
“So the next time you feel strong, clear, healthy, and alive, it’s worth more than $100 million to you. Are you treating it that way?”
One more.
“You get the money, your health, and a long life, but you never again get to see or talk to the people you love. No conversations. No texts. No communication. Taking the money?”
“No”
“So the very next time you talk to someone you love it is worth more than $100 million to you. Are you treating it that way?”
The beggar wasn’t poor because he lacked gold. He was poor because he never looked inside the box.
If you woke up this morning, you are sitting on gold.
If your body allowed you to move through the day, you are sitting on gold.
If there is even one person in your life you love and who loves you back, you are sitting on gold.
The question is not whether the gold is there.
The question is whether you are treating it like it is.
Want to feel rich?
Stop waiting for life to become valuable and start recognizing the value of the life you already have.
Because once you see the gold, you stop chasing what can be bought and start protecting what cannot.
live freed,
Jordan
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