Money makes me sad

Money is hard to acquire and easy to spend. This is the universal truth that everyone has experienced. Yet. If we really think about it, we are the ones making that saying true. We are the ones who make all of our spending decisions, and we are the ones who decide to add value to the-world in exchange for money. So if, money makes you sad, you are doing too much of the former and not enough of the latter.

Now you may be thinking that providing value to the world is hard work, which sucks, and spending money take s very little effort, which is not so sucky. I agree, yet if you examine human nature deeply enough you will find a strange truth. That truth is in the form of purpose.

Purpose is the pursuit of a worthy goal. It is not the attainment of a worthy goal, just the pursuit of it. It is as Ghandi said,

“The path is the goal”

Some have replaced the word "purpose", with the word "success". I would argue that both words actually reference the ultimate goal - happiness.

Psychology dictates that we, as human beings, require a sense of purpose to be happy. So having a purpose leads to happiness. If the goal (happiness) is to be achieve through purpose (the path) then logic would assume that we probably will not find happiness in idleness. We need to move. We need to actually be doing something.

My brilliant wife has a few sayings that I live by -  My favourite of which is,

"What can I do?"

This means that no matter your circumstances, you tend to always have SOMETHING that you can do to move forward. It is like in hockey - if you don't have a play, keep skating. As the situation moves, so do the options. Life is no different.

So money can make you sad or it can make you happy. depending on whether you are using it to move forward or not. Moving forward usually involves looking into the future.

A famous study showed that the biggest factor determining a person's success in life was not intelligence, good looks, connections or even race - it was long term perspective. You are moving forward if you are keeping the long-term in mind. If you invest your time, if you invest your money, if you invest in yourself, you are putting energy towards the future and you will receive payment in due course.

There are many stories of entrepreneurs that have worked at building a successful business for decades and finally they sell the company for a fortune and retire to live "the good life". In most cases, they end up bored and miserable within a very short time, because doing nothing removes their sense of purpose. They thought that sitting on a beach sipping Piña Coladas would bring them joy and contentment but it didn't.

This has nothing to do with being a workaholic or a type 'A' individual. This has everything to do with feeling useful. We all must strive for something to be happy. We need adversity. We need to grow. I often refer to the saying "you are either growing or you are dying". There is no staying the same. Nothing stays static in a living ecosystem. Because our universe is vibrating and blinking in and out of existence constantly, movement is the fundamental state of all things. The torus of creation and destruction is ever-flowing and we can go with the flow or be miserable. This means we need to always be creating new, and leaving something old behind us.

Change is the only constant so we must choose to change consciously or allow ourselves to be swept away by the winds of change.

Money makes me happy

How?

By making most of my money decisions in the direction of my purpose.

For example:

I value my time more than anything. If I can have complete control over how I spend or invest my time, I am a happy guy. So, if I direct my money towards things that support my goal of controlling my time, I am in alignment with my purpose, and therefore, money is making me happy.

If I spend my money on things that steal my time, I am sad. If I spend money on a sports car that puts me in debt, and I have to spend 5 more years working at a job I hate to pay for it, then I have not aligned with my purpose. I have stolen my time (my highest priority) and given it to my desire for status ( a MUCH lower priority). Once I know what I truly value, and how much it will cost, I will funnel my money to that end.

If I take my hard earned money and invest it in income-paying assets, I am buying back time. I am using money to create the life I want. If I spend money on a book or a course or a seminar that teaches me how to earn more money, then I am investing in my highest priority, as having more money to invest in income producing assets buys me more time freedom. Money is therefore making me happy.

So I guess the old saying money doesn't buy happiness is false. It does buy happiness. But it can buy sadness too. You have to know what it is that you truly value to be happy. You must know your purpose. You must have activities (movement) that makes you feel alive. Money, more often than not, allows you to figure what that is, and then do more of it.

If you are living a life where you feel like everything you do is dictated by your need to barely keep your head above water then you are a slave. You are not free, and the solution is not necessarily more money. It is figuring out what it is that you value and funneling the money you already have in that direction - deliberately. Money doesn't solve problems, but it is the fuel for the solutions.

So I guess I could say money doesn't make me happy, but it allows me to have the time, energy and means to make myself happy. So once you figure out what you truly value, figure out how much its going to cost and then put your money to work. Now your money has a purpose too. How nice is that?