Friday, November 16, 2007

MASTERING MONEY

The way to achieve money-mastery is to apply the above formulas. Write down your choices. Be specific. Specify what you want. The following ideas may also help:

  • For a business to succeed it is essential that the principals who own and operate the business have healthy attitudes about money.
  • Prosperity and poverty are states of mind - not states of pocket.
  • Many of us suffer from "poverty-consciousness." The opposite of poverty-consciousness is "prosperity-consciousness." The basic difference between the two is that the poverty-conscious person is a psychological slave of money while the prosperity-conscious person is a psychological master of money.
  • Money is a human tool. It is something we invented to make the exchange of goods and services more convenient.
  • Money also serves as a unit of value - we use it to measure the value of something in comparison to other things.
  • Money is further used as a store of value - it can move value created in the present into the future.
  • Money is used as a mover of value from one place to another.
  • If a Martian (with no earthly preconceptions) came to earth to examine this strange tool "money" she would be surprised and puzzled about the extent to which so many of us have become slaves of it - that we worry about it, fight over it, and kill for it. She might conclude that when it comes to money most humans are quite crazy.
  • Sometimes we measure the value of a person in terms of money: "He is worth a million dollars."
  • We can think of poverty-prosperity as a scale. At the one extreme is the state of mind of absolute destitution. At the other extreme is the state of mind: "I have or will get whatever I need with minimal effort." The latter needs to be a realistic attitude, rather than wishful euphoria.

The Three-Dollar Exercise
Here is an exercise that will help you move on the poverty-prosperity scale, from wherever you are closer to prosperity:

  1. Consider giving away three one dollar bills to three different strangers. The recipients need to be people who don't expect to be given money by strangers - not children, not beggars, not the homeless, not waiters who get tipped.
  2. Write down all the thoughts automatically generated by your mind, for example, "This is crazy," "It is pointless," "They will refuse to take it," "They will be suspicious," "They will laugh at me," "I will feel embarrassed," "I'm too shy to do it." etc.
  3. Notice your reluctance, if any, to do it. Notice if you feel any fear about doing it. Write down whatever you notice.
  4. Decide to go ahead with the exercise. Write down the "preparations" that you think you must make before giving away the money, for example, "What will I say to them?", "What will I tell them if they ask me why I want to give them money?", "What will I do if they refuse to take the money?"
  5. Go to a place like a shopping mall where there are lots of potential recipients. If you have fears about what might happen if many people saw you handing out money, notice this. You could also go to the convenience store on the corner, where there are not too many people, and you may be able to give away a dollar to someone without anyone else noticing. (Isn't it crazy what considerations we have about so simple an act as giving away a dollar to a stranger?)
  6. Give away your three dollars.
  7. Write down how you did it and how the recipients reacted. Notice your thoughts and feelings and write them down. What did you learn from the experience?
  8. Write down what you learned about yourself and your relationship to money. Did you notice any habitual negativity?
  9. Can you change your habitual thoughts and feelings about money?

We can think of humans behaving according to programs in their minds. To the extent that these programs produce desirable or worthwhile results, we can call them "human success programs." To the degree that they produce negative results, we might call them "human failure programs."

Prosperity-consciousness is a human success program. Poverty-consciousness is a human failure program. The purpose of the "three-dollar exercise" is to raise your awareness of any failure programs you have about money and to begin replacing them with success programs.

Affirmations
This is a systematic method for replacing human failure programs with human success programs. It is a method for reprogramming your mind, developed by Leonard Orr, founder of "Rebirthing":

AFFIRMATION               RESPONSE
----------- --------
I am a master of money But I don't have any
I am a master of money Why am I doing this?
I am a master of money You're kidding
I am a master of money This is a waste of time
I am a master of money I'm always broke
I am a master of money I will never make it
I am a master of money I always lose my money
I am a master of money Money is evil
I am a master of money Money is ugly and filthy
I am a master of money I really hate money
I am a master of money Rich people are evil
I am a master of money Etc.
  • Write down the affirmation which is a human success program in one column. In a second column write down whatever response your mind generates. The purpose of the response column is to bring your automatic, habitual failure programs into awareness, and to eventually replace them with success programs.
  • An extension of the method is to successively write the affirmation in the first, second, and third person:
    1. "I, Jack Jones, am a master of money."
    2. "You, Jack Jones, are a master of money."
    3. "He, Jack Jones, is a master of money."
  • A further extension is to say the affirmation aloud as you write it.
  • You can also take some of the responses and use their opposites as affirmations, for example: "To me money is beautiful," "I love money," "To be rich is good for me," etc.

The Treasure Map
A Treasure Map is a visual tool for building the inner experience of a desired result in its completed form in order to facilitate its manifestation. It is a pictorial representation of your goals. It is similar to the blueprint of the architect used by the builder to manifest the building.

Your Treasure Map can contain drawings, pictures cut from magazines, and photos. It may contain a photo of yourself having achieved the desired result. It can be any size you like.

It could also contain your fundamental, primary, and secondary choices. Your Treasure Map could be colorful - the more colors the better.

You may want to look at your Treasure Map when you wake up in the morning and just before you go to sleep in the evening.

Your Treasure Map helps create the "structural tension" Robert Fritz talks about.

Books on Mastering Money
The following books may be useful (see Annotated Bibliography):

  • Cosmic Profit: How to Make Money Without Doing Time by Raymond Mungo.
  • Do What You Love, The Money Will Follow: Discovering Your Right Livelihood by Marsha Sinetar.
  • Money Is My Friend by Phil Laut.
  • Moneylove: How to Get the Money You Deserve for Whatever You Want by Jerry Gillies.
  • Money Making Secrets of the Millionaires by Hal D. Steward.
  • The Seven Laws of Money by Michael Phillips.
  • You Can Have It All: The Art of Winning the Money Game and Living a Life of Joy by Arnold M. Patent.

http://www.buildfreedom.com
Copyright © 1992 Free America Institute ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

No comments: