Why Should You Get Rich? Believe it or not, one of my students did actually ask me this question! She didn't understand at all why anyone would want to be rich. After I asked her to explain what it meant to be rich to the class, it was clear that she had a mental block that kept her from becoming rich. She thought that "Rich" people got to where they were financially by using and hurting other people to make more and more money.
Is it any wonder that this woman had trouble saving money when she had that kind of idea in her head? She was always at war with herself. She knew she needed money, but whenever she saved too much, she would "splurge" on something and spend it all, which put her back in the position of living from paycheck to paycheck. Ouch! How bad does that hurt?
Sad to say, this student is not the only one who thinks this way about "rich" people. In my travels, classes, and seminars, I've found that about 45% of people who are having money problems have to deal with this first before anything else can happen. No, your credit card debt is not the problem, or at least it isn't the main cause of your lack of money.
The problem goes deeper than credit card debt. You haven't given yourself permission to get rich because you haven't answered these questions for yourself:
Do you think that money is good or bad?
- Do you want more money so you can buy things you or the people you care about need or want?
- Are you afraid of having too much money because it seems like the only people who have a lot of it did something bad to get it?
You should start by asking yourself some of these questions. If you think of money as a necessary "evil," it will be harder for you to find and save it, let alone use it wisely. Cash is not bad. Like a hammer, money is just a tool. You could build a house for someone who needs one with that hammer. You can also use it wrong to hit someone on the head. No matter how it is used, the hammer has no choice. Good or bad, right or wrong, the choice and the credit or blame are up to the person who has it.
Money is the same way. Money is a useful tool that lets you buy things you want. No matter how you get money, it has to be spent. You can buy the same amount of things with your paycheck as you can with money from a part-time job or coins you found in the parking lot. The shop owner and salesperson don't care where the money came from as long as it spends. The only thing that makes money "good" or "bad" is what you do with it.
If you think that money is "evil," you might want to ask yourself a few questions.
"What makes me think that money is bad?"
- "Does the way my parents handled money affect how I see things?"
"Do my friends have money and spend it wisely?"
Write down your answers on paper, and then read them out loud to yourself. Why? Because you won't be able to make or keep much money as long as you think it's "bad." When you try to change the way you think about money, it's important to know what's going on in your brain. If you want money to keep coming into your life and working for you, you need to decide what kind of rich person you want to be.
Once you have a clear idea of what kind of person you want to be and how you will handle money, you can start to make that happen in your own life. All you have to do is look at yourself and change your own ideas about what it means to be rich.
