Your relationship with money

Different people have different concepts on money. Some people define being financial free means not having to work or free from debt. Some people deemed being financial free as doing what you enjoy for a living.

Whatever the case is, it is important to define what your relationship with money is. Is your relationship with money based on fear, greed or ignorance? I came to realize that if we do not establish our relationship with money early on in our life, then we will forever have unfinished business with money. Allow me to elaborate.

Most people’s relationship with money is based on fear. We are socially conditioned to think that having a job provides us a secure income and that having a job is the only means of bringing food to the table to feed the family. However, ironically, very often we fear of being retrenched by the company during economic downturn.

We also fear of being sacked by the company when we reached our fifties and could not find another job to support our families. It is this sense of insecurity that most of us hold on to our job. To overcome this fear and insecurity, there is a need to internalize what your passion and aptitude are.

Only if you capitalize on what you are good at and what you like to do, then can you excel in your job and create a niche for yourself. If you are good and always in demand, then you need not worry about being sacked by your company. Even if you are being sacked, if you have niche skills, you can always set up your own business.

Another form of negative relationship with money is greed. If you are obsessed with money, it can become detrimental to many aspects of your life. It can impact the way you look at things and affect your relationships with people. Sometimes, it can affect your health too.

I have a few friends working as real estate agents. They worked very hard everyday and pumped in long hours of work so as to secure deals. Its a very competitive and stressful industry. Many of them are single, some are married but without kids and a few ended up as divorcee. Sometimes, in order to close deals, they also compromised their principles and made up truth. Many of them had told me that in order to be successful in this line, you need to be ruthless, hardworking and hungry.

I don’t envy them. Over the long run, I doubt they can sustain their health if they carry on in this trade.

Lastly, if you are ignorant about making money, there is nothing inherent wrong but you need to take note that it means you will be forever trap in the rat race. That means that you do not invest your money, do not create streams of passive incomes and do not have entrepreneurship spirit.

You will probably find it extremely difficult to attain financial freedom if you do not subscribe to the idea of making money work hard for you.

Magically yours,

SG Wealth Builder