I just received an email from an alleged banker in Senegal offering to send me $26,000,000 if I send him my bank account information. His long detailed email explaining why he has to find a place for this lost money has not convinced me to cooperate!

Most people are familiar with these types of scams and immediately punch the DELETE button after receiving one, which is what I did. But I’ve been surprised over the years how many people have gotten pulled into them and sent out private information which later was used against them and in harmful ways.

I remember a friend over 20 years ago, who was quite elderly at the time, sending money to a telemarketer who promised to send her a new Cadillac if she sent him funds to pay shipping costs and taxes. She sent the cash. No car ever showed up, and she was stricken with grief about it. She had little financial means to begin with.

Some scams are obvious. Others aren’t.

How do we protect ourselves?

One way, is to not lust after money and things in the first place.

Mortal mind preys upon lust. When we lust after something, we lose our perspective and make poor judgments. In an effort to find a weak spot, mortal mind dangles out promises of cash and prizes to see if anyone will bite. We protect ourselves from these fraudulent efforts but remaining spiritually content.

It helps to understand that we have what we need in God, spiritually, to live content happy lives. We don’t have to possess a lot of money to be happy. We don’t have to own truckloads of goods to be satisfied.

Happiness is spiritual, produced by God and felt in spiritual mindedness.

The more we cherish spiritual wisdom and understanding above money and things, the less gullible we’ll be to mortal mind’s deceitful ways of extorting our hard-earned assets.

In a mind-set of spiritual contentment, there are no weak spots for mortal mind to probe and test. We know we have what we need in Spirit, and that is enough.

Scammers, be gone.