Today I want you to think about and contemplate your relationship with money. The wrong money mindset can create anxiety, fear, frustration, and other negative feelings. In order to level up our energy levels, we have to work on our financial mindset. Our attitudes towards money are formed by our family, friends, community, and culture. Now that you have read Rich Dad, Poor Dad you know that simple things like “I can’t afford this” vs. “How can I afford this” can shape our money interactions, and therefore the flow or block of money into our life.
Is Money or Wealth Evil?
Our culture right now is in kind of a space where a lot of people are trying to get rich very quickly, but at the same time we as a society tend to believe that money is bad and that those who make a lot of money are evil. Part of this I believe is because there are so many bitter intelligent people teaching the next generation that money is bad. Let me explain. Intelligence is not the same as knowledge. You may have an intelligent surgeon performing an operation on you, but just because that person is smart enough to operate on you, would you trust then to design a bridge in your city that will safely hold all of the traffic that crosses it? No, unless they have attended engineering school as well.
So we have many intelligent professional people and professors who are super good at the careers they have studied but who have not studied finances. They do not have money knowledge, and as a result, their financial situation suffers. Society begins to believe that wealth is not a “smart people thing” but a “tricky people thing.” But in reality, all these smart people could also be wealthy if they put an equal amount of study into finances and wealth as they do into their careers.
People with wealth are one of the ways we keep our economy strong. They distribute wealth by creating jobs, they also do this every time they spend on any product, however useless the product may seem to us. A controlled economy has only room for basic businesses that serve everyone. But when there are wealthy people spending money we have people specializing in all kinds of things for them to buy.
Money Gives You Options to Help Others
And it is a no brainer that unless you have money, you are very limited on how much you can help other people no matter how generous you are.
Of course people can use money to do bad things. But people without money also do bad things. That is about the person and not the money.
As you create money goals, you should also include plans of how you want to help other people with your money.
Abundance vs. Scarcity Mindset
Two opposing mentalities are the abundance mindset and the scarcity mindset. Scarcity believes that the more someone else has, the less I can have. Abundance teaches us that there is enough for all if we approach our lives and money with the right energy. When we want the best for others, there is more of the best for everyone.
This book by Stephen Covey is the authority source on creating Win Win situations in your life.
Work Gives Money Value
A recent spate of stimulus checks has kind of given us all the feeling that we can get money for nothing. But that money has no value until you trade it for something that someone has made or for someone’s time to do something you need done. Work is what gives that money its worth. So to keep a balance, each person has to contribute work of some kind to society. When the balance is broken, when there are people who have to work too much for too little money or when people are getting money and doing no work, the economy at large suffers. Financial energy suffers.
I like big financial goals. At the same time, we have to be willing to hustle at the bottom of the ladder for a while to work our way to the top. Hard physical work is healthy, and we should never think we are above getting our hands dirty.
So our attitude toward money can shift. We can overcome mental obstacles to money opportunities. We can see that every dollar itself has travelled a long journey that represents countless hours of work, numberless interactions between people for necessities and luxuries. The story and therefore the energy flow behind every dollar is amazing. We don’t want to worship wealth or money, but we should recognize the potential for doing good it gives us. And we should embrace a mentality of abundance.