…Everything is a story.
In this post I’m going to be focusing on my relationship to money and the stories we tell ourselves to help reinforce our beliefs.
We cooperate effectively with strangers because we believe in things like gods, nations, money and human rights. Yet none of these things exist outside the stories that people invent and tell one another. — Yuval Noah Harari
Reading the book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (Amazon affiliate link) shed light on a lot of unanswered questions for me and stopped my obsession with trying to figure out what is the supposedly most natural and objective way for humans to live…
What’s the answer politically, economically, in our personal relationships, work…? I never grew up buying into any one belief system, have never been a part of any religion, and in many ways spent a lot of my twenties questioning social norms, but craving some sort of fixed belief system.
I recently started a new course by spiritual teacher T. Harv Eker called The Spiritual Laws of Money (Mindvalley affiliate link), and yesterday when I started module two, he also mentioned that everything is a story, and we get to make it up, which is what inspired me to write this article.
In my mid twenties I’d be ashamed to write that I was exploring the world of money and looking into what it actually is, because I’d created the story that money was evil and anyone who had it was just greedy and probably not a nice person. The result? I never had much, and was constantly thinking I can’t afford that…I ended up thinking about money or the lack of it way more than I would have liked to.
If you allow yourself to make all the money you need to flourish and live out your desires, it does not mean you are or will become, a greedy, selfish, Earth-ruining bastard. — Jen Sincero from You are a Badass at Making Money (Amazon affiliate link)
The older many of us get, the more fixed our view of the world seems to become, and in many ways, I feel I’ve spent considerable time breaking down a lot of the stories I’ve been telling myself. Money is something I’ve been working on for quite a while now and was drawn to Harv’s course because he’s been down both paths of money and spirituality and then carved a path where money and spirituality coexist harmoniously.
I like to view making money now as how many people I can help and how much can I give. It’s been interesting to examine how my beliefs have changed. I also love this quote by Jen Sincero.
I see it over and over, the kicking and screaming about how, at the end of the day, what’s most important is spending time with those you love, gazing at sunsets, rejoicing in the laughter of frolicking children, helping old ladies cross the street, and other things money can’t buy, and I won’t argue, but I will ask this: why the hell does it come up when we discuss the making of money? When did it become an either/ or situation? If you partake in the pursuit of wealth, it’s not like you shall never again attend a family barbecue, hug a puppy, or tiptoe through the tulips… — Jen Sincero from You are a Badass at Making Money (Amazon affiliate link)
Originally, I was looking for neatly boxed answers to the true nature of humanity. Was I supposed to get married or live in a commune that was all about free love? What’s truer for humanity — socialism or capitalism? And what exactly is money anyway? I now believe that we live in a world with sooo many stories existing side by side, it’s really up to us to choose what stories we want to live and play out because there are actually very few universal objective truths out there.
Something I’ve struggled a lot with over the years is buying into others’ stories. Module two of Harv’s course discusses this too. He mentions that “Whatever someone says to you, they’re simply projecting how they feel about themselves in this moment.”
I draw a lot of comfort in this because it stops me from (hopefully) taking things to heart, and I actually think this is a more empowering belief than trying to have everything figured out. It’s all just a story, and we create the characters, theme, setting, and plots for our own stories on planet Earth. How magical is that?
Take part in a free masterclass here to find out how you can stay spiritual and experience massive success. (Mindvalley affiliate link)
Recent Comments