Some advice for aspiring entrepreneurs: Take action NOW and stop putting things off until it’s comfortable.
How has your mind been conditioned around wealth?
MY thoughts on your conditioning around money…I’d LOVE to hear your opinions after you read this >>
Did any of those who conditioned your mind teach you the very basics of personal finance? Did they teach you how to balance your checkbook…the proper use of credit and credit cards…basic use of cash management…how to budge and pay your bills…much less even think about teaching you how to invest or put money away so that it compounds for you? If you can answer yes to even one of these questions, you’re in the minority…
The following excerpt perfectly describes the conditioning that most of us were and are still subject to.
“Money comes and goes in your life at different times. Mostly goes, when you’re young. Those are the spent years. Maybe the misspent years. But never mind. As you grow older, the urge to save creeps up on you. Here’s the typical cycle of wealth:
AGES 20 TO 30
You establish credit, buy your first furniture and appliances, take your first auto loan, learn about insurance and taxes. Maybe (here I’m dreaming (you save a little money, in the bank or in company retirement accounts. Retirement accounts are money machines for young people because you have too many years to let them grow untaxed. By the end of the first decade, you get married, have a baby, buy a house. (You save the old fashioned way – by borrowing some of the down-payment from your parents.)
AGES 31 TO 45
You don’t know where your money goes. Bills, bills, bills. College is a freight train headed your way. Maybe (here I’m dreaming again) you start a tuition saving account. Money still dribbles into retirement savings, but only if your company does it for you – buy taking it out of your paycheck before you get to spend it. When you’re pressed, you open a home-equity line and borrow money against your home. This is a good time to start a business or get more education. Invest in yourself and home for a payoff.
AGES 46 TO 55
You do know where your money goes: to good old State U. At the same time, you get the creepy feeling that maybe you won’t live forever. You thrash around. You buy books about financial planning. You have an affair. When all else fails, you start to save.
AGES 56 TO 65
These are the fat years. You’re at the top of your earning power, the kids are gone, the dogs are dead. Twenty percent of your salary can be stocked away – which is lucky because you will need extra money for your children’s down-payments (kids never really go away). Consider long-term care insurance.
AGES 66 TO 75
How golden are these years? As rich as your pension, Social Security, and the income from the money you saved. Start out by living on the first two. Let the income from savings and investments compound for a while, to build a fund for later life.
AGES 76 & UP
Quit saving. Spend, spend, spend! Forget leaving money for your kids-they should have put away more for themselves. Dip into principal and live as comfortably as you deserve. This is what all the years of saving were for.”
The Psychology Behind Your Cash Conditioning
We’ve been conditioned about our money benefits since we were young.
In fact, most of our beliefs were defined between the age of 1 and 8.
For many of us, our financial conditioning started while we were in our mother’s womb – we are the confluence of hundreds of years of conditioning – through our parents, grandparents, and great grandparents, etc. During the early years of our lives, our financial condition was influences to a great degree by those who provided care for us and were influential in our upbringing…our family, religious educators, and teachers.
Relative to money and finances, what ideas did our grandparents have about money? How did that cause them to behave in relationships to their money – were they big saves, did they think they couldn’t afford things, were they putting it away for a rainy day… or did they believe that money is the root of all evil?
Probably for most, they lived through the Great Depression which created an entire generation who have a scarcity mindset rather than prosperity mindset.
And, unless your parents decided to think and behave differently toward money, you were probably conditioned with the same scarcity mindset that’s passed down through the ages from one generation to the next.
Another way the generational scarcity mindset impacted our conditioning is that we were never taught to have conversation about money – out loud. It was as if there was some unspoken law that the topic of money was taboo! In fact, surveys indicate that family conversations about money were compared to a skeleton in the closet.
Think about the conversation you remember hearing about money…
How old were you?
What was the topic?
Who was conditioning you?
How did it influence your conditioning (positive, abundance, don’t have enough)?
So, my question to you is this: Is your mindset around money where you want it to be? If not, will you be the one who stops this pattern of a generational scarcity mindset?