Poverty Thinking

I had an interesting discussion the other day when a very nice lady was trying very hard to convince me that money was evil and I shouldn’t encourage people to want more of it.

Of course she brought up the old “money is the root of all evil” excuse which is actually a misquote, or at least an incomplete quote. The original saying is “the love of money is the root of all evil”. There’s a big difference there. Loving money for its own sake doesn’t make a lot of sense and can cause a lot of misery. But money itself is only an energy, its completely neutral. It can be used for evil such as weapons and drugs or for good such as education and healthcare and yes, even shoes!

My belief is actually it's the lack of money, or at least the fear of lack of money, that is the root of all evil. Fear creates stress and fear of not having enough money to do the things we need and want to do is one of the biggest stressors in life. When we’re under stress the Inner Reptile is in charge making us make short term survival decisions rather than long term strategic ones, and so our financial situation is very likely to get worse, causing more stress and even worse decisions. Its one of those nasty vicious circles again.

If we can truly believe in abundance, even if our current circumstances may not be supporting that belief, then we can stay out of the Inner Reptile’s clutches and make good decisions which will quickly lead us out of the temporary state of lack back to a state of abundance where we belong. But if we choose to insist on poverty thinking the Inner Reptile will do everything in its power to confirm that belief.