How Your Inherited Money Relationship Impacts Your Life
Life’s lessons are learned everywhere. The most pivotal lessons of our life, however, are learned within the framework of family and close friends. When we struggle in adult life with our emotions, our finances, our health, our relationships, our generosity, or indeed, in any area, it is helpful to take a step back, go within, and understand the impact that ‘stories’ from our youth have had on us.
Recently, I was asked an interesting question which set me thinking. The question was: “How authentic are you about your relationship to your money”? I have to say that it took me sometime to understand the significance of the question, and a much longer time to answer it with any semblance of satisfaction, and to accept that I really had significant feelings about money.
And so, I invite you to think of your own relationship with money, and the thoughts that automatically come to you when it becomes a topic of conversation. Can you say that you are authentic in your opinions of money at all times?
For many of us, our thoughts and conversations about money change dramatically, based on our circle of friends, on our perceived lack or surplus of money, and our need to ‘save face’ or possibly ‘brag’ about our own monetary situation.
Do you realize that the way we deal with our money today is as a direct result of the influences of our past? If someone has grown up in a household where there was a constant lack of sufficient money to live life above the existence level, as grown-ups there is a tendency to be either overtly frugal, or excessively wasteful.
Why is this? I suspect it is because as humans we always have to ‘prove’ something to ourselves. It may be that we wish to ‘prove’ that we are better money managers than our parents ever were, or we may wish to ‘prove’ that our lives are so well managed financially that we can afford to be generous in ways our relatives could not.
On the other hand, when one has been raised amidst affluent circumstances, there is a tendency to view money as merely a ‘means to an end’, there is the possibility of monetary abuse, of under-valuing the effort, thought and disciplined focus that was necessary to create the money surplus that is now being so casually taken for granted.
If we stop and take the time to think about it, we would realize that we are making choices similar to those we witnessed or heard in our childhood years and, we would then understand how little it took for us to become prey to these intrinsic values, and how diligently we continue to use them in our daily lives.
Katherine Whitehorn gave her opinion on money with this quote: “The rule is not to talk about money with people who have much more or much less than you have.” It is a rule on which many of follow through, without even pausing to think, and this suggests that we all have undercurrents of fear concerning our money and our relationship to it that we are not willing to face.
We place so much emphasis on money, on pursuing it, on struggling to have all that we can, that we elevate its purpose way above its true value. It is time to re-create our perception of money and acknowledge it for what it really is. Money is one method through which we can barter. It is a method of exchange, a way to give while we get, in a manner which leaves both parties satisfied that their needs have been met.
Bartering for goods and services has been successfully employed from Biblical days. Why can’t we continue to look at money from this viewpoint? I truly feel that if we did, it would automatically lose its obsessive grip on us, and we would be able to live more joyfully, more healthily, and definitely more successfully.
When we truly understand that money really does not help us to solve life’s problems, when we understand that our problems will be there with or without money., we will be able to create new possibilities for success and growth in our lives that are richer and healthier by far than the constant tension and avoidable stress we have allowed our relation with money to have.
We would no longer have to resort to clichés such s “Money is the root of all evil”, but could perhaps adopt Franklin D Roosevelt’s beautiful thoughts as noted in this quote: “Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement”
This can become our reality if we have the presence of mind to admit that the way we view our money is merely a function of our past beliefs and we can change this function at will. We can allow miracles to enter our lives in the form of new creations, and a new belief system!
Paricia Jones, Life Style Mentor and Successful Entrepreneur, is helping many become the next success story. Whether you're looking to create an extra few thousand dollars per month, be an ex-corporate executive, or the next millionaire Mom, Patricia can assist you to create a second stream of income and greater peace of mind. visit : Passion and Purpose
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