Let me say one thing for your sake and for mine: for years now, as they’ve grown clearer in my mind, I’ve slowly been embracing the principles enunciated in my book, and shifted the way I live so that I’m abiding more closely by these guidelines . . . but I’m not there yet.

So you’ll sometimes find me explaining and defending standards I don’t yet live by. That’s because either I see they’re true but haven’t yet gathered enough interior strength to make myself live by them or I’m in the process of changing from my old ways to the better ones I explain here, and I just haven’t completed the transformation.

So let’s you and I make a pact — about the principles that we discuss on this blog and about our lives. Together, we’ll inquire into the truth, regardless of where it leads us. Then, having seen the truth, we’ll each try to live in accordance with what we’ve seen.

But we’ll always understand that we each are works in progress, and we’ll never judge each other, but rather will support each other as we try to learn the meaning of our wealth and to discover the uses that each of us, in particular, are called to make of it.