We often hear the same questions at the growing number of workshops and training sessions for spirituality. In fact, the whole world is discussing it.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
We often hear the same questions at the growing number of workshops and training sessions for spirituality. In fact, the whole world is discussing it. People ask questions like “Why do we need to pay for spiritual knowledge?” and “Why does it cost money to learn Reiki?” They wonder why we need to pay to access the universal energy.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Do we really have to pay for the universal energy? No! Let me emphasize that it’s of course free, because it is the energy of the Creator. It is the energy of all that exists, and everything is energy. So, the energy itself is free because it belongs to all of us, not just a privileged few. It belongs to us and everyone else as well. What we pay for is the time and knowledge of someone providing a service. Before teaching us about an aspect of spirituality, this person has no doubt already undertook considerable training, spending much of his or her own time and resources in the process. This person is now spending his or her time and energy transmitting those experiences to us. This is what we pay for.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
And we go to a training center for this. The trainers in such a place must pay their rent, taxes, and utility bills like anyone else. As you mentioned, these people need to follow numerous courses and go through many experiences during their personal development phase, and this involves putting in lots of time.
Begüm Güven Karace:
We pay for the things like that, yes. We pay for the trainer’s knowledge, experience, energy, and time. We pay for the venue where the training or healing session takes place and the other costs that are incurred. We do not pay for the energy itself.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
When I go to a supermarket to do shopping, the shopkeepers don’t say, “Hey! It’s Hasan who heals people with Reiki. Come in and help yourself to whatever you want!” They ask if I want to pay with cash or credit card?” The system of our world runs this way, with money.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, this is true in our time. We know it was different in some previous eras. For example, in ancient times, Shamans received only presents and not payment. In other times and under some conditions, we know money was not accepted for healing or therapy.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
It is still the same in India and some Eastern countries.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes. Our own ancestors experienced such times. It exists in our genetic code, in our oldest genes. These contribute to our belief patterns, and we forget that we commonly pay for the time, knowledge, experience, and overheads of professionals. This belief pattern reasserts itself and says, “No one should have to pay for spiritual energy. Charging money is shameful and should be banned!” This leads to many healers, or let’s call them “transformers,” getting into financial difficulties, despite being highly talented and experienced in their practices. These old belief patterns therefore need to be cleansed and purified.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
I have always said there is a big difference between being paid for doing something and doing something because it will bring money. I had a friend in the 2000s. He was a healer whose reputation had just started to spread back then. I will always appreciate his honesty, but do you know why?
One day, he told me, “Hasan, I don’t care about knowledge. I don’t care about the teachings. I make money through this business, and that’s the only thing that matters. I don’t care about the rest.”
I remarked about how honest he was. So, what happened next? His teachings became popular and two different models emerged. On one side, some people decided to continue his path with these teachings because there was money in it. On the other side, some devoted themselves to serving people and touching their souls, while of course receiving money in return. This group comprises people who feel guilty for receiving money in exchange their services. Although they may be good people, they face difficulties. There is also a third group who prefer not to receive money for their services, but they are generally rich people who do not need money and can offer their services for free.
Begüm Güven Karace:
They experience difficulties, and because these difficulties decrease their quality of life, they cannot reach as many people as they otherwise would.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
How can you learn something from someone who is starving to death? This is another fact.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Certainly. We should see if these people put their knowledge into practice. They should resonate with what they teach. This knowledge should be present in their fields, so they can transmit it to others. If their fields are empty, it means you are together in a learning process, which is also acceptable. All teachers and therapists heal themselves during their sessions, learning while they teach. This is normal, but we all expect to have teachers and therapists that resonate with the energies they deal with and show it.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Those who give their services freely and receive nothing in return run up an even bigger debt: gratefulness.
Begüm Güven Karace:
There is also a danger of imbalance. We are told money is a form of energy, so we should let it flow. It is important to let it flow toward me and then out from me. If I restrict this flow at any point, such as by refusing payment for a session, the client will have difficulty healing. This is because the energy is not flowing freely. The client cannot keep this energy within his own field. It may be possible at that moment, but after a while, he cannot keep this energy in his field and still resonate with it. He cannot receive energy because it is not flowing anymore. It has become static.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
All these practices have material and spiritual dimensions. There is a therapist and a client in the process first of all. For example, I have been there many times. I’ve had sessions with you and with other therapists. You touched my deepest points, and sometimes in a single session, I really had the opportunity for development that would normally involve many reincarnations. This is something on the spiritual level. It has no material equivalent, because it is entirely spiritual. I am talking about three or four reincarnations, which I believe in, yet you can heal many problems in one or two sessions through the techniques you use.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Let me chip in here. If you practice a spiritual teaching that dissolves your past lives, past energies, or your genetics. As you mention, they dissolve within this energy field. So, let me ask why do you practice such a healing process? Is it to make a difference in this life, to heal your life? You ground yourself to this world through such practices. We need to ground the energy to the world, which means you need to materialize it. When you materialize this energy, you feel it through your body. Paying and receiving money provides this grounding. Otherwise, all practices remain only on the spiritual level.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Secondly, the healer gives his time and makes great effort, so he or she should receive something in return, but it doesn’t always need to be money. For example, I was a student of Gülüm Omay’s. She taught me Reiki, while I designed a web site for her. There may be other forms of bartering. If you pay for this energy somehow, it falls into place on the spiritual level, but if you give nothing in return, you lose that spiritual energy because it cannot be materialized at the mundane level.
Begüm Güven Karace:
We practice all these spiritual teachings in order to heal our lives, don’t we? Is this correct? Who can say otherwise? We practice spiritual teachings in order to heal our lives in the here and now, so I need to materialize all the spiritual studies and ground them to the world. Giving and receiving is a way to do this, to materialize the energy. It is a wonderful thing. Paying with your own goods or services is wonderful, but grounding the energy is also wonderful when money is concerned.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
If a healer looks into your eyes during a session, you gain a greater benefit from the healing session. When you settle each other’s debts in the material plane, it goes down better. However, if a healer is only interested in the material side of the business, if he or she is only concerned with money, you will not benefit from such a healing session. This is the reality of it. Sometimes people just hide behind the argument of give and take, that I did something for you, so you should give me something in return. Again, the focus is on the material once more, and there is no benefit here. Many people believe this, though.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Healing, or what I like to call transforming, is an occupation that helps people to reveal the best things hidden in their essences and access their potentials. It also helps them to seize their power. The same goes for the therapists and the teachers. This occupation is a branch of the service industry. We know that those who work in this sector with willingness and meticulousness are generally successful and make money, but we see how anything made only for earning money is hindered somehow.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
I can give a very concrete example from my life about this issue. I met someone called Mustafa and told him about my articles. He moved to Germany at 17 years old, where he cleaned toilets for a living. He also worked as a peddler and dishwasher. He said to me, “I was so passionate about what I did. I didn’t care if it was cleaning up shit.” He later became a reputable businessman in Germany and owned many jewelers’ shops. Then one day, he asked himself, “What am I going to do with all this money?” He could have invested in opening more stores, but instead he downsized his business. He now attends many training sessions, which is where we met. Do you know what most fascinated me about his words, though? He said, “Give me a toilet brush, and I’ll go clean toilets again, and I’ll do it with passion and love.”
Begüm Güven Karace:
Whatever you do, you should do it passionately and meticulously. Being meticulous is very important. If we undertake our business with passion, and if we do our best, we may be successful in what we do and reach the results we hope for, whether it’s appreciation, money or whatever. Let’s look at what we have done so far. Let’s look at our lessons at school. Which subjects did we like and study with passion? Which lessons did we study just to pass the exam? What were the results? Which subjects did we really learn, and which do we use in our lives? Care, love and joy are important in whatever we do. When we have them, money comes to us somehow, because it is already energy.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
It comes to you through unexpected means that you never dreamed of. Say you attend an interview for a new job and straight away ask what your salary will be. You try reach a certain point first, but then the system cannot carry it and collapses.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Of course, we bargain to a certain point. We ask the price of something we want and try to get it within our budget. This is the nature of the material and mundane dimension. On the other hand, we also see how we feel about it. Does what we do bring us joy? How do we feel on the energetic field? Do we take a session or healing because it’s cheap or because we really enjoy it. Does it make us feel better? Do we think it will benefit us? These are crucial.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
These are crucial, yes. People sometimes ask me how I chose my teachers in the world of spirituality. Of course, I do not say the most expensive one is always better. You need to do some research first—this is essential. I always say the same thing. First research any potential teachers. See who they are, what they’ve done, where they studied, and so on. Read any articles they’ve written, and see if their energy matches with yours. Once you pick one, stand in front of him or her and feel that person’s energy. This is very important while choosing a teacher or therapist. Your energies must match.
Begüm Güven Karace:
That’s right.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
What makes you feel good may not work for me. What makes me feel good may not work for you. Everyone resonates with different things and different branches. We cannot categorize everything under the scope of spirituality, because everyone takes a different path. Some people feel closer to Eastern teachings, while others relate more to Western teachings. Others prefer completely different teachings or are happy to just read books instead. Everyone takes a separate path this way.
Let’s return to spirituality and money. In one of his speeches, Eckhart Tolle said, “For fifteen minutes, I could talk about why spiritual practices should be free, and you may say I am right. Then for another fifteen minutes, I could talk about why you should pay to learn spiritual teachings, and you again may say I am right.”
When I first started giving speeches, I did not receive any money from the audience, yet only ten to fifteen people would attend my speeches. Now, we’re talking about Eckhart Tolle here, the number one in the world. He said, “When I started charging a fee for participants, many people came in and I became popular worldwide.”
He said he had a therapist friend who had an Indian guru. This American therapist originally received money from her clients, but her Indian guru told her that this was tantamount to prostitution. He told her, “How dare you charge money for spiritual teachings. This is such a sin.”
The woman apologized numerous times before returning to America, where she started giving therapy without receiving any money in return. Someone then told the woman that she could accept donations instead, so she started doing this. Then one day, a new client came. Before the session, the client told her how she had bought a $500 jacket but now it was too tight for her. She talked for more than an hour, followed by a two-hour therapy session. Afterwards, she left just a $10 donation. The therapist was angry at this, because the woman could easily afford 500 bucks for a jacket but placed so little value on something that was very important for her life. She then decided to charge what she deserved.
Begüm Güven Karace:
It’s not that you should pay for everything. Of course, some things will be free. You may make a donation yourself or benefit from a scholarship. We should share our knowledge with those who are ready and able to receive, like we are now. However, as Eckhart Tolle said, and as I also mentioned before, people who consult you may more easily benefit from your healing if they pay for it, because they can ground it and materialize the energy they receive. Let’s consider it like this.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Right, and on the other hand, it helps the continuity of the process. When the energy flows there, you feel motivated and benefit from the process. One day, one of my friends had a problem, so I advised him to consult a therapist I knew. I told him that the process would be fine for him. He asked me what the fee would be, and I told him 40 bucks. He said, “Oh no, that’s way too expensive. I’d rather buy a new graphics card for my PC. I know someone I can use without paying.”
So, he wanted to change something in his life, but instead of paying $40 for it, he preferred to buy a graphics card. Fifteen years have passed, and this person still has the same problem. On the other hand, there are some people who really need the knowledge or training but cannot afford it. When such people really don’t have the money, a therapist who loves what he or she does will never reject them.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, exactly, but still something should be given in return. As I said before, it relates to the flow of energy. The training or healing sessions could be paid for through barter, just like how you designed a web site for your Reiki teacher. This also helps the flow of energy. If we experience problems with receiving money for our healing sessions or seminars, or if people tell us that our services should be free, we should again look at our own beliefs. Do we hold a past belief that such practices should be free? Do we believe that we do not deserve to receive money? Do we believe that we are not good enough to receive money for our services? Or do we believe that what we’re doing is worthless? These are the common beliefs that stop healers and spiritual teachers.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
What stopped me was being afraid of being judged as a money-centric person.
Begüm Güven Karace:
If you have such a belief, you probably grew up in a family where people were accused of being money centric.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
That’s right.
Begüm Güven Karace:
In any case, these beliefs in our genes are like a background process running on a computer. To take a step forward and to overcome such beliefs, we first need to see how these beliefs serve us and how we benefit from them. Then we can get rid of these beliefs when we see how they serve us. We then manage to take action despite being accused of being a money-centric person.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
I know where this money-centric thing comes from. I inherited it from my mother. She would always judge herself like that, and I know I do what I do to avoid being known as a money-obsessed man. On the other hand, I accuse others of the same thing. I always think what that’s belief is for. In our last interview, we mentioned that money is a feminine energy. My mother always loved her divine feminine energy. This was what she sees in money. Yes, my mother loves money really, but she distances herself from money and therefore her feminine energy.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Now, she loves money, and this is a wonderful thing. It is certainly not a bad thing. When you consider money a bad thing, when you have such a belief at any level, you repel money. Then we feel anger at those who welcome money to themselves, because this is really what we want to do as well. We feel anger and jealousy for what we do not have.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
That’s true: anger and jealousy. Just a side note, but my parents worked at a bank. There was always lots of money under our noses, but it was never our money. This is the karma of bankers.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Incredibly, when the money issue invokes anger and jealousy, it blocks the prosperity of both the healer and others. If I get angry because someone else has money but I do not, it really means I want to have money but cannot acquire it because of my subconscious beliefs. I then begin to reveal my self-resentment as anger and jealousy at others. As soon as I feel this way, my abundance and prosperity becomes blocked. That’s why there are so many people who cannot earn enough money despite being good at their work.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
The reason for jealousy is absence. The thought of not having what others do.
Begüm Güven Karace:
What underlies it all is the belief that having money is a bad thing.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
We can feel love, but we can keep it away. We love money, and we can grab it, but we do not let go of it.
Begüm Güven Karace:
It’s because you believe it is taboo, something prohibited, sinful, or bad.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
It is the same with sexuality. Do you know money and sex are highly related? They have the same mechanism.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Let’s say their mechanisms are similar because they are both related to the material world. They are concerned with the material, to this body and this world. They are related to existence, the existence of humanity. We need materiality and to exist within the body, and these are related to each other. They’re also both related with the lower chakras.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
We judge two things more than anything else: money and sex. As we judge them harshly, our world is so chaotic.
Begüm, what kind of a burden is gratitude? We did not talk much about this issue, but you said gratitude is an important concept.
Begüm Güven Karace:
The debt of gratitude is something hard to repay. You can never be sure if you’ve paid it in full, so you can never feel at ease. The debt of gratitude therefore always keeps people in the relationship of debtor and creditor. Carrying your spiritual practices to the material plane and receiving a certain amount of money for them creates a situation where a willing buyer pays a willing seller, thus sweeping away any debt of gratitude. For as long as a debt of gratitude is not redeemed, however, one party will always be above the other. We know everything that exists wants to sustain its existence and be seen. If there is a debt of gratitude, and if a person feels he did not pay this debt, and if the other party feels he did not receive what he deserved, then one starts hurting the other.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
And so the conflict begins…
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, somehow a conflict arises between the two parties. Hostility starts between the student and the teacher, or between the consultant and client, even though they enjoyed a good relationship before, because the energy between them is now unbalanced.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
It is not balanced, yes.
Begüm Güven Karace:
So both parties face unwanted situations. The anger and other negative feelings that occur here decrease the frequencies of both parties, blocking their abundance and prosperity.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
We saw many similar examples in previous years. I started involving myself in spiritual teachings in 1995 and encountered energy practices in the 2000s. They were just starting to become widespread then. However, there is now an industry in the US, the wellness industry. It has a huge net worth of 10 billion dollars. Americans really know how to create an industry from something, and the system is really based on capitalism. They really know how to build a system on something.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, life always requires balance. Society generally gets stuck up on the material and mundane issues, so concentrating on spiritual practices gives the balance that the soul needs. That’s why it can become an industry so easily. I think they do wonderful things, and I respect and like much of it. It is something on a corporate level, a way to reach as many people as possible.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
But here the problems occur while maintaining the balance. We want to climb the stairs as soon as possible, so we always meet people who want a shortcut to enlightenment or those who become teachers after just a short period. This is a problem.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, many things seem like that, don’t they? For example, you take your car to the garage and the mechanic changes a headlight and wants payment for it. You think you could have changed the headlight yourself. Or what if your television breaks down. When I was young, we had a huge TV at home that would sometimes break down. My father would take it apart and repair it, but some small parts would always be left that he had no idea about. I always think that people who are masters of their own domains should work at what they know best, and we should also learn to mutually respect what we all do.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
This is what’s called the mastership level. It is the level where you think you can do what another person does, but you can’t. The master of that skill does his job so well that it looks easy to you, so you incorrectly believe you could do it too.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, experience, knowledge, love and devotion… These are very important in whatever we do.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Yet for those who want to give consultancy, knowledge, and education, these are crucial. I’ve never given one-to-one consultancy, nor do I want to. It is not my domain. I graduated from a faculty of communication, so communication is my field. Many people provide one-to-one consultancy, but I never wanted to engage in many things simultaneously, so I focused on communication. On the other hand, I also thought I may come across certain situations that require medical knowledge. I had to know how to deal with these situations, but did I really feel qualified for all these things? I did not want to jump in with the courage of ignorance.
Begüm Güven Karace:
You mentioned the industrialization in the American system. Yes, there is a system like that. There are some systems that tell you to get a diploma and other systems that say you should attend seminars and get certificates of participation before starting your practice.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
People become life coaches in just two days.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, that’s a fact. First, however, you should take responsibility for your own life and be willing to change or transform the things in it. This should be the main motivation for everyone before dealing with the issues of others. First, you need to feel happy about the changes that you made to your mood and your social and daily life. You may then start teaching the same things to others or providing benefits on an energetic level. If we can consider the issues from this perspective, we may balance the existing situation where people think they can give a few seminars and earn the money we spend on them.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
People always ask me something: “I want to know myself and do something new. I feel attracted to spirituality on the level of the soul but lack the money. Do I really need to study with trainers, teachers, gurus and masters?”
People also think that if everything is already in the mind, we can discover it alone without help from another. Okay, I respect this opinion, but think about how a healer or consultant can help you. Sure, we all walk alone on our paths of spiritual development, but we also benefit from the many experiences of others on our path. What is your opinion? Why do we need people to guide us?
Begüm Güven Karace:
We do not need to reinvent the wheel—it was invented long ago. Of course we can read books, but to practice them in life, we may need someone to illuminate our path. That said, no one is going to open up our heads and insert what we should learn, because we should know how to practice what we learned in order to make positive changes in life. We are the ones that walk on our paths. It does not matter if you attend a hundred seminars, because just one seminar may change your life.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Besides, you are the one who must walk this path. You will not become enlightened because you paid a thousand bucks for a seminar. That’s not how it works.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, it is indeed not the case. Let’s say you read five different cookbooks and watched numerous cooking shows on TV. You then proclaim yourself a wonderful cook and recite tasty recipes, but when someone asks you to cook something, you can’t.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Marvelously put.
Begüm Güven Karace:
You can recite the recipe flawlessly, but ultimately you need to go to the kitchen and prepare it. Someone in the kitchen may show you where the pans are, where the cutlery is, where the ingredients are kept, and how to use the equipment. They may tell you to wait a while for the onions to turn pink. This person may help you in many useful ways. In the end, you will cook wonderfully, because you have already read so many books and watched numerous videos.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
You mean we need to unite knowledge with practice, and someone else can show us how to do this. In contrast, if you want to do everything yourself, you first need to find everything you need and work out how the kitchen equipment works.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Exactly, you need to take the longer path. Perhaps you will burn your food a few times and your meals may be tasteless at first. You will get good eventually, but you will get there much faster if you work with a master chef and observe. If this master gives you advice while you cook, you will quickly learn to make delicious meals.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
If the Creator wanted us to follow just one path, all these various paths would have never existed. We become richer through each other’s experiences. For example, I may learn some basic cooking from you and use your recipes. I may then learn some different techniques from other cooks, and eventually I may be able to invent delicious meals of my own. When someone asks how I learned to cook, I tell him who taught me. In short, I get something from everyone. The meals I cook are never the same as someone else’s, because we may use different ingredients. There is always variety, and nature requires this. This is what the Creator requires, so let there be variety. Let’s grow up with different perspectives. At this point, we all need each other as masters and guides.
Begüm Güven Karace:
So, why did the Creator give us so many different paths?
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
Now I feel like a student being asked a question by his teacher…
Begüm Güven Karace:
So let me be the one asking now.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
It’s because the Creator loves variety.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Well, let me explain what I think. We are on this world to see, accept, and understand all that is. We know we are all one, and we all aim to reach the tree on a mountain that Osho described. We can reach it easily when we respect others who follow other paths. We must respect all paths.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
You know there is an illustrative image with eagles and snakes on the mountain. The snakes crawled there, while the eagles flew. Each arrived by different paths.
Begüm Güven Karace:
Yes, but we cannot criticize the snakes for crawling because it is their nature. I believe all these paths are wonderful. I bow respectfully before everyone walking on these paths.
Hasan Sonsuz Çeliktaş:
I bow respectfully before you, too. Thank you very much, Begüm, for this great interview.
Begüm Güven Karace:
It was my pleasure.
