Why America is the ‘For Profit’ Country

Originally posted on Apr 03, 2020 on medium.com/@shamandao

Photo by Anjo Clacino on Unsplash

Let me first start by saying I am proud to be an American. Born and raised here, I have been given opportunity after opportunity to exchange fragments of time for money. At one point, it was a lot of time given for a lot of money. I was living the American Dream.

It is the one place you can come and make a name for yourself. I even once met a woman while traveling in Asia, who came to America as an immigrant with her husband. They built up a multi-million dollar jewelry business in Southern California without ever learning how to speak English. She spoke only Vietnamese, Chinese, and Spanish. Spanish because that’s the main language of the men she picked up from Home Depot for various tasks and manual labor.

She raised a lawyer, two doctors and a CEO who are pillars in their societies. Kudos to you, my dear, kudos to you.

Tolive in America is a dream to the rest of the world. A dream many, I mean many, try to achieve. It’s their dream to ‘make it,’ here because of what is portrayed on television to the stories their lucky friends and siblings relay back to them. While they eat a cup of noodle and share one bedroom with three other immigrants trying to ‘make it,’ in America.

We are a for-profit country in every single way. Everyone is busy working their tails off to make a profit to not only provide for themselves and families but to keep up with their luxurious lifestyles that scream, “Look at me! Look what I have!” Nice clothes, nice shoes, fancy cars, $100 brunches and weekend trips to Vegas in a semi-private jet are what goals are made of.

We idolize Lamborghini Avadator’s butterfly doors while comparing ourselves to overnight successes. We have sold our souls to identify our worth with how many zeros we have in our bank accounts.

For more than half of Americans, they’re skidding by on less than $1,000 in their emergency funds. One car, health, home emergency and they’ll be in the red.

When I was in my twenties, I heard from a friend who got a job as a pharmaceutical sales representative. The pay was good. Base salary starting in the six figures with commissions on top of that. She was on schedule to make almost two hundred thousand in her first year. Not too bad for a first-year pharmaceutical sales rep.

She urged me to apply. “It’s so easy, Dao. If you can do what you’re doing now as a mortgage banker, you’ll make so much more money doing this,” she said one day over lunch. I thought about it, but there was something that made me feel uneasy. I didn’t feel comfortable selling pills to a doctor to get commissions based upon the volume sold.

For a great sales representative, you need to believe in your product. Your conscience will make itself known to you if you are not aligned in the values and purposes of these types of positions.

“So let me get this straight. You go to doctor’s offices to sell them your product. The more product they sell, the bigger the commission?” I asked her. She nodded her head immediately. “What’s the product?” I asked.

She went down the list of products her company was selling at that time. A list that I didn’t feel was in favor of any patients. I thought about it then as I think about it now in a time where our nurses and doctors do not have enough supplies to protect themselves at work from the coronavirus. Where shipments of these crucial supplies wait to be unloaded at our docks. But first, payment please. No payment, no supplies.

This is America. If it’s not making money, what’s the point?

Where has common decency and humanity gone instead of looking at each other as another number? When and why did it turn into a for-profit society instead of for the people? Why has money or the perception of success defined us as to where we don’t care what the effects or consequences of our actions anymore? It is a one for one, not a one for all syndrome.

I thanked my friend for lunch. She paid because instead of a normal lunch between two friends, she was there to recruit me. She knew my work ethic and past successes in each one of the companies I worked for, including the company I was at during that time.

Something inside of me held me back and thank God it did. It was my good ole intuition, that gut feeling that nudged me to stay put where I was. Even though the money would have been amazing, I did cherish my sleep and conscience more than an extra zero or two in my bank account.

I saw a post the other day of a woman with the initials of, Dr. before her name. I guess that title gave her the right to put down someone to tell them they knew nothing about the immune system. She told them that upping your Vitamin C intake would not make your immune system stronger.

She would be considered a prime example of someone who has sold her soul to gain a profit.

We have been fed and given only the surface truths of our society. Who is at the root of the unjust and villainous acts that go on underneath the dark web of lies that trap us every single day?

Once you break out of the matrix and become aware of yourself and the surroundings, the facade of pretty painted pictures will begin to dissolve. And below it, will be the truth of our lives.

I’ve never been one to hold another person higher or lower because of their status, their wealth or their titles. I have always treated people the same throughout all the companies I worked for from the cleaning lady, Hi, Letty!, to the Directors and Presidents, Hi, Shannon!

I once allowed the President of Bolivia to walk past me. He shook every outstretched hand except mine and my close Spanish friend’s. What he said at the art show gallery to the Spaniards in the room was an absolute insult to everyone there. An art show exhibit given as a gift from the Spanish embassy.

Que cosa horrible decir, What a horrible thing to say, I thought as my friend, Mercedes looked at me. We listened as the President of Bolivia continued to berate them. President or not, it’s always what counts on the inside, not the outside.

The soul, the spirit, compassion, kindness, and consideration of a person is what drives me forward. Not a title, their vacations, their wealth or their material possessions, which is all external. We strive for things outside of us instead of going inward to reach nirvana.

That’s true enlightenment. That’s true wealth. But we are so spiritually poor as a country, we’ve placed all our worth on the external.

For most of us, we cannot see the true value in another person, experience or place because we do not see our true values. What we perceive is a reflection of our beliefs, bias, and ideals. The projection of our inner selves at this moment in time is strong. So strong that it is showing not only to each one of us who we are but to each other who we are.

As a ‘for profit,’ country, we have placed more value on all things external, when it’s the internal crying for help.

Blessed be.