Money Is Not Paper — It's an Exchange of Energy
Before getting into the steps, Dr. Saulitis suggests changing the picture itself. We're used to thinking of money as an object: here it is, here it isn't, someone "got" it, someone "lost" it. But viewed through a psychiatrist's eyes, money is above all an indicator of how a person's energy exchange with the world is functioning. How much of your bodily and psychic strength you give out — and how much comes back to you. This isn't a metaphor for the sake of style; it's a working principle you can use to check your own life.
Picture a person underwater. There's no air at all down there, and he's suffocating, straining to get to the surface, grabbing at anything — at any cost, just to survive. Now picture a person standing one meter, ten meters, a hundred meters above the waterline. The difference between "a bit higher" and "much higher" is no longer so dramatic for his everyday comfort — he can breathe calmly, think, choose. This image matters: the desperate race for money, the panic of "there won't be enough," "I'll miss out" — this is the state of a person who feels as if he's underwater, even if objectively things aren't that bad. And conversely, calm doesn't arrive when money becomes endlessly abundant, but when you stop suffocating — that is, when your inner energy exchange is functioning properly.
Here lies the danger the doctor speaks of directly: you can earn a great deal and still be, essentially, an "energy donor" — giving away your health, your nervous system, your sleep in exchange for money, and then paying entirely different bills later. A high position, a large salary, but ruined health — that's not a victory but a hidden debt that will inevitably come due. So before you rush off to earn, it's important to understand: do you want to build a flow that nourishes you, or a drain that exhausts you?
The four steps that follow are built on exactly this logic. This isn't a ritual or a matter of luck, but a sequence: first the body, because without working "hardware" nothing will function; then the mind, because even working hardware without the right program produces chaos; then the ability to find your own work, where effort yields maximum return; and finally, protecting your energy from those who drain it for nothing, and the inner confidence that holds all of this together. Each step follows logically from the one before, and skipping the first — jumping straight to "positive thoughts about money" — is like trying to run software on a broken computer: no matter how much you click, nothing will work.
A practical step, even at this stage: before reading further, ask yourself honestly — am I currently "underwater," gasping for air, or am I simply standing not as high as I'd like, but still breathing normally? The answer determines exactly which step you should start with: urgent bodily recovery, or straight to adjusting your thinking.
Step 1: Put Your Body in Order
The first and most frequently violated principle is stated by the doctor bluntly, without detours: until the body works, the head won't produce anything of use. He compares it to a computer:
"If your body isn't working, it's like hardware in a computer that's no good at all. For the head to work, you need a healthy body."