The Problem with Reconnecting with Odinani for “Money”
In recent years, there has been a renewed interest in Odinani, the indigenous Igbo spiritual knowledge and belief system. This reconnection is typically framed as a return to roots, identity, and ancestral wisdom. But quietly, and sometimes loudly, another motivation slips in for some: money. Wealth. Prosperity. Quick elevation.
This is where the problem starts.
Not because Odinani rejects abundance, but because approaching it with money as the primary goal stupefies its meaning and breaks its logic.
You Will Never Be Satisfied, Only Temporarily Stimulated.
When money is the foundation of a spiritual reconnection, satisfaction becomes impossible. Financial gain has no natural endpoint. There is always more to want, more to compare, more to chase.
Odinani, however, was never built to feed endless desire. It exists to cultivate alignment; between a person, their Chi, their community, and the cosmos. When alignment is replaced with acquisition, the spiritual journey becomes a treadmill. You may experience moments of excitement or perceived “breakthroughs,” but fulfillment will remain out of reach.
You Will Be Constantly Disappointed
Money-centered spirituality breeds unrealistic expectations. When outcomes don’t match hopes, when wealth delays, fluctuates, or arrives with complications, disappointment follows. The system is then blamed. The ancestors are questioned. The tradition is dismissed as ineffective.
But the failure was not Odinani. It was the wrong question being asked of it.
Odinani was never designed as a vending machine. It does not exist to “pay out” for rituals performed or identities adopted. Expecting predictable financial returns from a cosmology centered around balance, consequence, and destiny is a category error.
You Reduce a Complex Spiritual System into a Means to an End
One of the deepest problems with reconnecting for money is reductionism. Odinani becomes instrumentalized, turned into a means to an end rather than a way of being.
This strips it of its philosophical depth:
Its moral framework
Its emphasis on responsibility and consequence
Its insistence on character (agwa)
Its long view of life and lineage
When money is the goal, ethics become optional, patience becomes inconvenient, and inner work becomes a distraction. The tradition is mined, not lived.
It Disconnects You from Your Chi Instead of Aligning You With It
In Igbo thought, true success flows from harmony with one’s Chi. But money-driven spirituality pushes people toward imitation rather than authenticity. You begin copying paths that worked for others instead of discovering what is correct for you.
This creates inner conflict. Even when wealth comes, it feels unstable or alien. The body resists. The spirit feels restless. The person senses, intrinsically, that they are off-path.
Odinani does not reward misalignment simply because desire is intense.
It Encourages Spiritual Impatience
Ancient Igbo life was not built on urgency. Nothing of value was rushed; marriage, leadership, land acquisition, or spiritual authority. Reconnecting for money imports modern impatience into an ancient system.
This impatience clashes with Odinani’s values. The result is frustration, shortcuts, and eventually disillusionment. People want outcomes without transformation, status without responsibility, blessings without burden.
But Odinani insists that your capacity must match what you receive.
It Empties Reconnection of Its True Power
The most tragic consequence is that money-centered reconnection prevents people from encountering what Odinani actually offers:
Deep self-knowledge
Psychological grounding
Moral clarity
Communal belonging
Peace with uncertainty
Acceptance of destiny
These are quieter rewards. They do not trend well online. But they are the foundations upon which meaningful prosperity, material or otherwise, can stand.
Without them, money only amplifies inner emptiness.
A Bad Foundation Cannot Hold a Sacred Structure
Money is not evil. Wealth is not forbidden. But making money the reason for reconnecting with Odinani is like building your house on quick sand. The structure may stand briefly, but it will crack under the weight of expectation.
Odinani asks a different question of those who return:
Who are you meant to become?
What are you responsible for?
What must you understand before you accumulate?
When those questions are ignored, disappointment is inevitable.
Reconnection rooted in identity, balance, and truth may not promise riches, but it offers something rarer, which is a sense of PEACE, a life that makes sense.
