There’s more to being rich than just stockpiling dollar bills. So says Ernest D. Chu, author of Soul Currency: Investing Your Inner Wealth for Fulfillment and Abundance. Chu asks us to imagine a new kind of currency, a currency that “could fill your life with love, passion, and satisfaction…[a currency that] would rise in value as you became more aware of it… [a currency that is] in circulation all around you all the time….” It cannot be stolen, lost or exchanged, and we all have enough of it.

That’s the soul currency of the title, an integral part of our lives that we use without even realizing what we’re doing. But spiritual assets can, according to Chu, be used to create physical wealth. “While we’ve all heard that money can’t buy love, love –soul currency—can help you attract money.”

Soul Currency helps the reader translate traditional terms such as “currency” and “asset” into spiritual terms. Chu also uses different exercises to help the reader recognize and learn to activate soul currency. One of the first exercises is the eBay Game, designed to help us recognize our spiritual assets. Very simply, we are instructed to choose one of our assets – a sense of humor, for instance, or good health or optimism or any other inherent trait — and determine its worth on Ebay. It’s certainly eye-opening to realize that these every day assets we possess yet seldom think about are worth far more to us than we realize. How much money would you have to have in exchange for your spiritual faith? For your ability to dream? Through this and other exercises, Chu teaches us to view currency in a new way by expanding our definition of assets.

An equally surprising revelation is “counterfeit currency,” which Chu describes as an ongoing fear, a mindset that keeps us tense, miserly and miserable because we are constantly on alert for loss or pain or other negative experiences. He lists for us the seven deadly counterfeit beliefs and teaches us how to eliminate this counterfeit currency from our lives.

Ernest Chu is a former investment banker and member of the New York Stock Exchange, as well as a business coach. His understanding of abundance is firmly grounded in the necessity of cold hard cash as well as spiritual wealth. Chu teaches, through lecture, exercises, and case studies, a model of prosperity that is incorporated into every aspect of our lives. The concepts presented in Soul Currency are invaluable, and the practical guidelines will resonate with readers who recognize the need for a larger definition of wealth.