Don't Chase The Money

Chasing money is what keeps us from experiencing the ongoing natural state of abundance. The need to chase after money is not a reflection of how things really are: it’s a scarcity point of view we create. It’s the place we function from when we tell ourselves: “I don’t have enough. I never have enough. No matter what happens, I will never have enough.”

When we chase money, we cut ourselves off from the infinite possibilities that are available to us. Please don't chase the money, let money chase you!

When you are chasing money you are operating within the limitations of this reality. You reject what you could have. You function with far less power, ability, joy, fun and money than you could have.

If you think that you have to work hard in order to have money and you don't have a sense of ease with it, then you will constantly create that hard work and lack of ease as your reality. Don’t chase the money, chase the dream and money will follow!

The Secret to Long-Term Wealth?

Creating sustainable long-term wealth is really about how to go from where we are today to where we truly want to be in the future. It's about increasing the quality of our financial future by developing the one fundamental skill that the vast majority of people have never developed: financial awareness.

The need  to be financially aware and literate is often overlooked yet an increasingly important task for all of us. We can never feel confidence about our investment portfolio as long as we lack financial awareness. Our deficiency in this capacity works at a deep level to undermine our financial well-being. This isn’t “woo-woo” stuff: it’s just how awareness works.

Very few people choose to make financial awareness their priority, and that’s why so few people succeed financially. Unfortunately, most people believe this is something we pay our broker or financial advisor to do for us. With this viewpoint, we can never be in charge of our own financial future. The good news is that it's not too late for most of us to take back ownership and begin to develop financial awareness to change our situation for the better.

In our view, financial awareness is the make-or-break ability that determines whether our financial activities will be wasted, or rewarded. If we don't understand how we will make money on investments and we can't see the risks, we certainly will not be able to create sustainable longterm wealth. Without awareness, we always put our personal finance at high risk. One of the fastest ways to lose money is to start investing our money into things we don't really understand.

Financial awareness is the appreciation and understanding of how finance and investment works in the world, and the ability to use this knowledge and skill to effectively manage financial resources efficiently at a personal-level. 

Our longterm wealth is determined by our awareness, choice, and action. With financial awareness, we know what action we need to take to have an income for life and to able to survive and thrive in any market condition.  It’s one thing to know what to do, and it’s something else entirely to get it done. That’s why the capacity to take conscious action with enough consistency and to manage money with awareness are so critical. 

Become the master of our own finance

Many of us spend our whole life doing the things that are supposed to lead us to a great life but actually lead only to more struggle, stress, and insufficiency. It’s because instead of choosing to cultivate confidence about finance and become the master of our own financial reality, we chose to operate within the limitations of this reality. We have chosen to be in agreement with everyone else about what is. We have rejected what we could have.

One of the areas most critical to creating a great life is also the area that gets the least regard. Think about that for a second. Choosing to operate within the limitation of this reality has more appeal to most of us than choosing to become the master of our own finance, and have financial freedom. How ludicrous is that? Lack of financial literacy is the one thing standing between most of us and being abundantly wealthy.  Our lack of financial literacy leads to making poor financial choices that then have negative consequences on our financial well-being.

Being the master of our own finance is about more than just making good investments. It's just as much about the behaviours, the attitudes, habits, mindset, and outlooks we possess about money that is applied to our daily life, as well as the priorities we choose to live by. 

The good news for most of us is that we can change the points of view that keep us from being the master of our own finance. The way to start off on the path is to make a simple choice to acquire the ability to understand how money works in the world,  how to manage and invest it with awareness.  The most important step in becoming the master of our own finance is to spend time to financially educate ourselves and learn to have our money make money in the way that works best for us.

Creating great wealth and being the master of our own finance is within our reach. It’s been done by many people before, and it is truly possible for each and every one of us if we choose to become prosperous and wealthy. But it requires us to be and do different to create a different reality. Many of us choose what feels familiar or comfortable. But if we’re choosing only what feels familiar and comfortable, and if we continue to choose the same things we have always chosen, we will continue to get the same results we have always gotten.

THE KEYS TO BECOMING THE MASTER OF OUR OWN FINANCIAL REALITY:

1. The willingness to step out of our comfort zone. Start looking at what else we can create and what we can do that will create a different result. Live in the question “What can I do different that will create a different result?” This question will keep us in the forward motion of creating wealth and having financial freedom.

2. Acknowledge what it means to become the master of our own financial reality. It is important to have a clear insight of our underlying vision, desires and priorities. We can start by asking ourselves, ‘What do I want to create as my life?’ What do I want to do in my life? How do I want to live my life? What does it mean to me to be the master of my own financial reality?’ Knowing what we would like to create will lead us to what we’re looking for. If we don’t have a clue about what we’d like our life to be, we have no idea what to choose or where to go. We don’t know where to put the energy to generate our life.  Everything we choose in our life is based on the energy we’d like our life to be.

3. Manage money well and have clarity about our money flows. We must know how much money is coming in and how much is going out…. how much revenue we are generating and how much money we’re spending on our expenses. Create a system for tracking our daily, monthly, and yearly expenses. To become the master of our own financial reality we have to be serious about money management.

4. Cultivate the ability to acquire multiple streams of income producing assets, as well as understand the practice of balancing and rebalancing investment portfolios.  Establishing personal investment objectives and long-term investment strategies prior to making investment decisions is the ultimate solution to achieving financial freedom. A clear investment strategy will enable us to look beyond the moment and put into perspective why we are investing in the things that we do and why we are spending our time today as we are. With clear strategy and through consistent rebalancing, we can ensure that our portfolios remain adequately diversified and proportionally allocated.

5. Discover how to build net worth by owning income generating assets and make the money really work for us, instead of just focusing on creating cash flow. It's generative assets that produce recurring income that create real wealth, because these assets grow and revenue flows from them. One of the reasons most people don't have financial freedom is they spend all their time and energy focusing on producing cash flow. Cash flow gets us through life and allows us to just survive in this reality, but acquiring multiple income generating assets will create financial freedom and different possibilities for us. In order to build a generative net worth, we must first understand the difference between an asset and a liability as well as understand how to make tax-conscious investment decisions.

The most powerful influence: Your points of view

Your points of view are the things that ground you in your reality and are the basis upon which your life is created. They are the most powerful influence in your life. Your points of view about money may be positive or negative, conscious or unconscious or anti-conscious, turbulent or harmonious, energizing or draining etc.. Think about it for a few minutes…I invite you to reflect on what are the dominant points of view present in your life in regard to money? And more importantly, what would you like it to be?

Please reflect on how you spend a typical day in conjunction with money. What are you doing and thinking in relation to money? Are you working hard for it, spending it, worrying about not having enough of it, planning what to do with it, or avoiding thinking about it? Your perception and your points of view are you, so the more downbeat and self-defeating points of view you have about you, the less successful you will be.

So, observe … What points of view, judgments, and emotions do you have when you think of money? What is money to you? (When you think about money, what are your first thoughts?) Be honest with yourself. Be honest about what emotion you are feeling. It will do you no good to do this exercise unless you answer truthfully.

The following are negative common points of view that can tie you up in personal conflict. See if you identify with them.

• Making money is just too difficult.

• Money only comes from hard work.

• Money causes fighting and unhappiness.

• Money is in short supply.

• Money is a big responsibility.

• Money is filthy and dirty.

• There is a limit to how much I can earn.

• I just don’t like to think about money.

• I am just not good with money.

• I cannot handle or manage money well.

• I do not have unique talents or abilities.

• I cannot change my predetermined fate.

• I’m not good enough to make money.

• I cannot do what I love because it does not pay well.

• I can only earn more when I put in more hours at work.

• I need lots of money first to make more money.

• I can’t charge that much…..I can’t charge more than my competitor.

• I am never lucky.

• Miracles rarely or never happen to me.

• Only dreamers think they can get rich but I am a realist.

• It is difficult to make money from my investments.

• To make money, I have to have a great job with a high salary.

• The cost of living is so high that it is impossible to keep up.

• There is only so much of the millionaire pie to go around.

• Life is meant to be a struggle, not a breeze.

• It's not right to have a lot of money.

• It’s hard to have multiple sources of income coming in, other than from my job.

• It is best not to earn too much because I don’t want to pay more in tax

• It is just too difficult to get ahead based on my lack of academic qualifications.

• If only I had enough money, then I would be much happier.

It's important that you are aware of what your assumptions and definitions of money are, since you're bringing money to yourself with your conscious awareness. Have you ever had the above points of view about money?  These judgments, thoughts, feelings, and emotions are the major reasons that you have unconsciously repelled money and wealth. It is critical for you to truly perceive this truth.

What did you deny the ability to create that if you didn’t buy that point of view, would create more than you could possibly imagine? 

How many points of view about the problems of money have you bought that keeps you from having everything you desire?  What are the assumptions and limiting beliefs you function from in life? These have created your financial destiny and your financial world. Are you willing to see that there is more to life, and in fact, life is easy if you choose it to be that way?

Start today by letting go of the limited points of view about money that do not serve your best interests. It’s not intelligence or lack of education that holds you back from being prosperous and wealthy, it’s the limited points of view about money that keep you struggling to survive in a world of infinite possibilities. If you want to have generative wealth, you have to be willing to destroy and uncreate your limited points of view about money.

“So what is it you are not willing to let go of, absolutely unwilling to let go of, that if you let go of it, would allow you to generate so much money that nothing mattered to you?”

When it comes to money, the best advice is to always look at it from choice, possibility, awareness and prosperity consciousness. Never look at money from a fear and scarcity point of view.