If you had a million dollars to give away, who would you give it to?
Let me share three stories. Two coming from Russia and one from the USA.
But before, let me share a reply from one of my friends who is an accountant in one of the Arab countries. When I asked him what the overall situation looked like with his esteemed clients, he replied: ” I understood that both have and have not s , have a common denominator.” What is is I asked him. Well, they both have a HEADACHE. 😀
I am writing this below wishing that it could serve as a medicine.
“October 8, 1906 — Leo Tolstoy refuses the Nobel Prize in Literature
At the age of 78, the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy declined consideration for the Nobel Prize in Literature, firmly convinced of the moral harm of money.
When the Russian Academy of Sciences nominated him, Tolstoy wrote to his Finnish friend and translator Arvid Järnefelt, asking him to intercede with the Swedish Academy to award the prize to someone else.
Järnefelt — surprised but loyal — fulfilled the unusual request.
As a result, the 1907 prize went to the relatively unknown Italian poet Giosuè Carducci.
Tolstoy later said that his refusal spared him the heavy burden of deciding what to do with such a large sum of money.
He believed that “in money itself, in the very possession of it, there is something immoral.””
The next two are shared in this post!
First refused maths award of one million usd declaring: ” I am not interested in money or fame. I do not want to be on display like an animal in a zoo!” Insead he was harvesting mushrooms in the forest…
Second refused a contract of 8 million usd with a recording company.
So, the question, the right one, would be, why would you need that one million at the first place?
And the last one is the video that narrates the real story about two friends. One decided to become a monk…
To use the current way of ending
Thank you for your attention on this matter.
September 10, 2025
Darko Richard Lancelot
Philosophyofgoodnews.com
Connect and Respect
Well, one coffee treat is not a million… 😀
Philosophyofgoodnews 