Lending Money to a Friend
Karmayogi
Money lent to a friend is lost. It
is also helps you to lose the friend is the wisdom of the world. Many
rediscover this truth in their own experience. There is another side to this
phenomenon, which is perceived by wise people. Sometimes one lends a large sum
to an intimate friend, which he cannot afford to lose. When his family sees it
is not coming, they press him to get it back. The friendship being such, the man
refuses to act and tells his people, ‘‘Don't exercise your minds on this issue.
The money will not be lost. God will suitably compensate me.'' The family gets
irritated beyond measure, but refuses to see the events that made his words
true.
Money is power. Lending to a close friend is a generous act of
compassion. Power when extended to another strengthens his hands and naturally
leads to his assertion. He takes no initiative to part with that extra dose
of power on his own. Necessity makes the lender ask for the money back.
Sometimes it is returned. At other times due to bad temperament, the
relationship is broken and the money lost.
Compassionate or cultured
people are unable to bring themselves to ask for the money and keep quiet. As
the money is power and power acts according to its rule, the original act of
lending is a generous one and evokes a generous response from life, which brings
in very generous return to the lender.
In one case when the receiver felt
the full power of money and vulgarly asserted against the lender, the lender
vowed NOT to ask for it back. After a few years the entire amount came back
unasked. The lender's capacity not to curse the friend inwardly had a far more
beneficial effect. A sum exactly ten times the amount was put into the lender's
hand by a friend of his for an investment. In view of the fact that that sum was
a thousand-fold his present salary, he was able to appreciate the generosity of
Life. To be able to see several sides of a known phenomenon extends the mental
perception to spiritual insight.