Your Focus on Money is Keeping You From It

I write this as a kind of open letter for my friend and fictive kin, brother-from-another-mother, Z. I hope the insights here help you and many others struggling with cultivating a mastery of their “money mindset”.

Money is the most abundant thing on the planet.

Think about that statement for a second. I mean really stop and meditate on it.

If you’re broke, struggling to make your way or find yourself constantly saying things like “If I just had more money, things would be good.”, I want you to stop wherever you’re reading these words and ask yourself this question: Is your life good?

If you answered “No” to that question, let me hit you with this: Are you ready to die right now?

I’m 90% confident you also answered “No” to that question.

It’s clear there’s something keeping you in the land of the living. I’d venture to guess that thing keeping your zest for life and living is not simply money.

Perhaps you’re a man of ambition. Perhaps you have some debts to clear. Perhaps this, perhaps that.

Know this: Your were born free.

Before you popped out of the womb, God freely gave you all the time you will ever have in your life – He gave you sheer, unadulterated freedom.

It’s only as you got older, bigger, and dumber with bills and responsibilities did your freedom awareness become compromised.

When you were a little boy, did 10-year-old Z ever worry about FPL or needing to drive Uber to pay for his rent?

Don’t get me wrong, this shit I’m talking about – the psychology around money – is not easy. While the concept is simple, mastery of it all is very fucking hard.

I can’t say I’m totally there yet myself – perhaps I never will be.

A Solution: Lead with Value & Service

Author of one of the best books on the modern entrepreneurial mindset titled The Millionaire Fastlane, MJ DeMarco, talks about how when we focus on just making money, money tends often to elude us.

He contends that in order to truly start raking in the cash and become a truly free Fastlane entrepreneur, we first have to cultivate a give-value-first mindset.

This means instead of looking to get a job or start a business saying “What’s in it for me?” and “How much money will I get?”, we should first ask ourselves “What can I do or offer the world to help and be of service?”

You see, when you focus solely on helping your fellow man with his problems, money has this funny way of coming to you naturally.

I look at money like a jealous girlfriend who’s very vain and self-conscious. She loves to play hard-to-get. You chase her, you try courting her, you even spend money you don’t have to take her out on dates in the hopes she’ll grace you with a little more attention.

But she plays coy very well – many of us would say she does this too well. She’s a fucking relationship savant playing Jedi mind tricks with your heart–and ultimately your wallet.

Give Her the Ole Switcheroo

So we know money is a jealous girlfriend. And it’s been said that a “problem well-stated is a problem half-solved”.

We know our opponent. We know her temperment. We can use this to our advantage.

Start ignoring money’s text messages. Leave her on “read”. Let them things turn green even (for my iPhone folks out there).

Go out into the world with the sole mission of serving your fellow man.

Be curious and ask tons of open-ended questions of the why, how, and what variety?

Take stock of your skills and apttitudes. Be a sounding board for these people and then go away to figure out how you can potentially help solve some of the challenges in their worlds.

Offer free value up front–an introduction, a coffee, anything. Reel them in…

Then take a look back over your shoulder to see what is conspiring just behind you.

Your jealous girlfriend, money, all this time you’ve been working, she’s been plotting. Plotting her way to reclaim some control of your attention.

Her only tactic: flirt and give you more time-of-day.

Open Your Bank Account

Once you’ve served – and pissed money off – enough. Go check your bank balance. You’ll be pleased to see money has returned to you.

You see, her Jedi mind tricks start and stop at your perspective – your money mindset.

To apply this lesson ain’t easy, but it is simple: Focus on helping others, forget about the money.

Then watch how you have to push that jealous girl off you constantly just to have your space.

Godspeed.