Starting to learn about how to prosper without first considering "Why prosper?" would be like starting an important business trip without asking where you wanted to go, why you were going, or what you wanted to experience once you got there.  Prosperity, defined as an attitude, a way of being that creates a desirable world, requires that we know what we want and why.
     This is a pivotal time for women, and it is very ap-propriate to be asking ourselves such questions as: What do I want in life?  What do I want to pursue with my time and energy that is worthwhile?  Do I want to be rich and successful?  Why do I want to prosper?
     Giving ourselves permission to prosper, to be all that we can be, demands that we define our basic philosophy of life.  When we ask, "Why prosper?" we are really reflecting on the philosophical basis of our goals.
     What is the bottom line for you - why do you want to prosper?  What are you trying to satisfy in your life?  What motivates you to reach out and do your very best, to excel?
     We all have a need to fill an existential pit of emptiness, but that is rarely satisfied with material manifestation.  Many feel survival is the prime motivator, but do we need affluence to meet our survival needs?  They are easily met with a few hours of work a week.  If simple survival were the goal, carrot stew is awfully cheap.
     Philosopher Alan Watts claims survival is the last of our worries.  He feels the existential question in life is what to do with the nine-tenths of our time that we don't need to use in working for survival.  Women are ready for something more positive than survival.  We've had enough symbolic slaving over the hot stove and cold typewriter.  We have a desire to feel that our lives are somehow worthwhile that what we are doing has deeper meaning.

     Life has seemed an either-or proposition to many women.  Either you devote your life energies to having a career and money-making activities, or toward loving and serving others.  We are learning that these goals are not opposites; we do not have to choose between them. The spiritual, loving path leads through the world.  Money, success, power, fame, prestige, and spirituality are all interrelated - they are our inner and outer work at one and the same time.
     Our human dilemma is a need to balance these two aspects of our growth - the spiritual and the pragmatic.  Wee need to expand and reach for connection with our higher selves, to feel unity, and get a sense of direction.  At the same time we need to 'ground' our insights, and express our total self in the day-to-day world in meaning-ful ways.  If either dimension - the spiritual-emotional or the pragmatic - takes over, we experience crisis.
     For example, the business person who ignores the emotional side of life often has an inner sense of grayness, meaninglessness, in spite of plenty of outside reward.
     The housewife who over-identifies with her giving-nurturing side, and devotes herself exclusively to her family, is likely to sense the loss of her personal identity over time.  The equilibrium is gone.  She may not be aware of the inner conflict, only of being depressed and dissatisfied.  She finds herself provoking arguments and being overly critical and judgmental.
     The need for balance is evident again.  Attaining wisdom, love, and prosperity need not be at odds - they can contribute to one another in a flow toward even greater personal growth.  In other words, it is not only possible, it is also desirable to have love, wisdom, and wealth in our lives.
     But why be wealthy?  Is its value only in the luxuries and leisure it affords?  Emerson saw prosperity in the form of wealth and power as a natural state for human beings:
 

Poverty demoralizes .... Men of sense esteem wealth to be the assimilation of nature to themselves .... Power is what they want, not candy - power to execute their design, power to give legs and feet, form and actuality to their thought; which, to a clear-sighted man, appears the end for which the universe exists .... *

*Brooks Atkinson, ed., Selected Writings df Ralph Waldo Emerson (Modern
Library, N.Y., 1968) pp. 697-698.

     Webster defines prosperity as "a state of being suc-cessful with vigorous and healthy growth." If our purpose in life is unity and harmony with all that exists, then prosperity, as an inherent element of growth, is part of our search for wholeness.  To prosper,is to grow, to fulfill one's destiny, to be all that one can be.
     Prosperity for ourselves pre-supposes prosperity for all.  We are all equal; there is no one among us who deserves more.  The laws of prosperity are similar to the light of the sun: it shines on all alike.

     How can everyone prosper?  That seems to contradict everything we have ever been taught.  Contrary to common belief, the economic pie is expandable.  We do not live in a universe with limited good.  Only our concepts of ourselves and of how the world is set up are limited.
     We are living in a period of time in which economists say we must prepare to cut back, to do with less.  They point out that our resources are used up or are running out.  Unemployment rates are high and going higher, along with inflation - sure signs of recession.
     While it is true that we are coming to an end of an era, it is also true that the possibilities are still unlimited in this new 'Aquarian age' we are entering.  We have only begun to tap the potential of female energy, for example.  This is our age to produce.  We are part of the balance the world needs now.
     Ours is not to lead or prosper by exploitation, but to balance the male's thrust that has catapulted humankind to dizzying heights in technology.  As a result of the unbalanced development of this technology, for exam-ple, we have created the most fantastic destructive capabilities through nuclear weapons and guided missles without even thinking about the total insanity of it all.
     Physical force has long been extinct as a necessary survival technique, and logic alone provides a narrow view of human affairs.  The intuitive, imaginative powers of the female are needed in this strife-torn world.  The thinking creative male welcomes, with a sigh of relief, the new-age woman's willingness to share in the tre-mendous responsibility for creating the good life.

     Women have a message worth hearing.  It is for us to produce, to help create a synthesis of coexistence princi-ples by weaving tapestries of feminine qualities of love and understanding into areas of power - government, finance, and business.
Finding our own personal and universal purpose is a life goal we must discover for ourselves before we know what part of the tapestry we can best weave.  Without purpose we are lost.  The joy of prosperity is only possible when we know we're on our path to self-expression.

     What is it that only you can say to the world?  What needs to be done that can best be done by you?

     In my attempt to remind myself that there is a greater purpose to life, I keep this posted where I will see it every morning:
 

Keeping in mind
    The true nature of the universe
    The real reason for life
    The essential core of my being
    The divinity of all around me
I rise each morning to meet the day
Asking to remember - all day.