What if I told you that poverty is a mindset? This is definitely true in the United States and the “developed world.” But what if I told you that this is still true even if you live in the developing world? Please understand that the last time most people checked, there was no person holding a gun to people’s heads forcing them to be poor.
Poverty, just like affluence, is a result of several choices. In fact, it’s often the result of habits. One of the most important habits we have is how we choose to think. These assumptions that we choose to subscribe to impact our expectations and, ultimately, impact our actions. If we keep making the same decisions over and over, we really have nobody else to blame except ourselves on why we end up in the same tight financial spot.
Believe it or not, there are certain assumptions and beliefs that will not only make you poor, but work against you to ensure you stay poor. Keep these in mind because if you see this on yourself, it’s your responsibility to step up and start thinking other thoughts so you can take your financial life to a different direction.
The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Poorer
One of the most common phrases people say when they see a disparity between how much they’re making and how much other people are making is the statement, “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.”
Implicit in this statement is that there is really nothing they can do about it. Implicit in this is the idea that there’s some sort of system that ensures that the rich remain rich, while the poor end up in a worse spot.
This thinking really is all about giving up responsibility for making the right choices. Maybe it’s not a system that ensures rich people get richer. Maybe it’s because of your decisions.
Rich people became rich due to their decisions. Sure, a lot of them inherited their money, but somebody, at some point in time, made the right call, and that’s what started the family wealth. If they can do it, why can’t you?
So instead of trying to comfort yourself by taking yourself out of the equation and absolving yourself of any responsibility for why you are facing tough financial times, step up. Understand that if they can do it, you can do it too.
Now, this doesn’t mean that you’re going to be a billionaire overnight, but at least you can improve your present financial situation. Unfortunately, the more you continue to believe that the rich somehow have this built-in advantage and there’s really not much you can do and things would just get worse over time, the longer you will stay miserable and poor.
I Can’t Afford That!
How many times have you said this statement? Well, the next time you say it, stop. Ask yourself, “What does this statement say about myself? What does this statement say about my belief in my ability to make changes in my life?”
Understand that when you say, “I can’t afford that,” you’re making a factual claim. You’re saying that this is a fact. You’re not saying, “How can I afford that?” or “Can I afford that?” You’re not asking a question. Instead, you’re making an affirmative statement of reality.
Believe it or not, your mind is always paying attention to the stuff leaving your mouth. So if you keep saying the same phrase about yourself like, “I suck,” “I’m ugly,” “I’m poor,” “nobody loves me,” “I’m a loser,” then, believe it or not, that’s going to be who you are.
When you say, “I can’t afford that,” you shut off all internal dialogue regarding whatever it is you’re looking at. Try to change things around by saying, “how can I afford that?” That way, you ask yourself a question.
If you see a Lamborghini or a Ferrari on the street, say to yourself, “how can I afford that?” This can trigger a chain reaction of problem solving and mental puzzle playing that can possibly trigger you to make necessary changes to start achieving greater financial results.
Getting Rich is Mostly About Luck
A lot of poor people have all these ideas regarding luck. They think that it’s just this mystical or magical quality that some have and some people just don’t. In other words, it’s a lottery. It’s distributed in a completely random and arbitrary manner.
What if I told you it’s the opposite? What if I told you that people who are predictably lucky are like that because they worked for it? I’m not talking about lucky from time to time. I’m talking about lucky 80-90% of the time.
Yes, there are people like that. Whether we’re talking about the stock market or any kind of business deal or even interpersonal relationships like closing a sale, there are people who perform at that level and it may seem like they’re just at the right place at the right time doing the right things.
But if you actually pay attention to what they’re doing, it turns out that there’s a lot of preparation to be at the right place, to say the right things to the right people so the right results happen. In fact, being in the right place at the right time requires your ability to spot opportunities as they temporarily flash in and out of existence.
Believe it or not, you’re always surrounded by opportunities, but unfortunately, you did not allow yourself to be trained to be able to spot them. This is why it seems like rich people are just lucky. They’re not. They just train themselves to be able to spot and take advantage of opportunities as they present themselves.
The good news here is that if they can do it, you can do it too, because this is not hard wired into your genes. It’s not the result of some sort of cosmic lottery. It’s a series of decisions. It’s a series of lessons that they chose to learn, and you chose to ignore.
Well, by simply choosing to stop ignoring these lessons, you can turn your luck around. Ultimately, the more you work at spotting opportunities and taking advantage of those opportunities, the better your results. As the old saying goes, the harder you work, the luckier you get.
Rich People Simply Inherited Their Money
The whole idea that rich people simply inherited their money is a mental construct intended to do one thing and one thing alone: stop action. Seriously. When you see somebody who’s really wealthy, you say to yourself, “well, they just inherited their money anyway” or “they may not have inherited it, but their parents inherited it” or “they started off with enough capital and that’s how they became rich, assuming that they’re self made.”
Well, any of these thoughts really work to robbing you of the possibility that you can do the same because the moment you start believing that these people actually had nothing and they worked to put together whatever it is they have now, puts you in a negative light if you think about it because if they had the same amount as you now, but they were able to make something out of what they had, what does that say about you? What does that say about your choices? What does that say about your values?
People don’t like to be in this tight spot because they feel they always lose out. Instead, I look at it from the other perspective. I look at it as an opportunity. It’s supposed to sting. It’s supposed to hurt. Because if a person who came into your situation with far less money than you now is worth a hundred or a million times more than you, then maybe this is the wake up call you need. Maybe you can use that sting to your ego or that crushing feeling as a wake up call to start making better choices.
Unfortunately, when people wrap their minds around the idea that people just simply had advantages coming in, they prevent this process from taking place. This series of mental realizations just simply don’t take place.
I understand that it hurts. I understand that it says certain negative and even cutting conclusions about who you are and what you think your place is in the world and your value as a person. However, for real change to happen, often times, we have to hurt. We have to go through the pain for us to gain a better reality.
Unfortunately, when you start thinking that rich people simply inherited their money or the best things in life are already taken or the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, you numb the pain. In fact, it doesn’t even register. You just say to yourself, “Well, this is my lot in life. Life is just a giant lottery and I got the losing numbers.”
It’s your choice. I’m not saying that if you start making different choices now that you would be an overnight billionaire. I’m not saying that at all. But believe me, if you make the right choices now, you would at least improve your situation.
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