Financial Freedom
How is your financial vision; can you see what looms over the horizon? Today, people live in debt, without real financial freedom — so, it isn't realistic to go along with the way the majority think or act, and expect to do well in the future. Yet, financial freedom is not just for the rich. Most of us can learn how to meet our financial needs, envision and plan for a better future, find opportunities to build wealth, and enjoy the things that money can and cannot buy. Financial freedom is about having the highest quality of life you can, beginning now.
This is the basic outline of the course:- Lesson 1: Your money and your life
- Lesson 2: The world of finance
- Lesson 3: Learning how to make money
- Lesson 4: Wealth creation
- Lesson 5: Money myths
- Lesson 6: Investment
- Lesson 7: The world of business
- Lesson 8: Having greater success, now
- Lesson 9: An eye to the future
The goals are to:
- overcome illusions and limiting social conditioning about money
- gain understanding about credit, debt, and finances
- learn how to make better financial decisions, and create wealth
- learn about saving, business, and investment
- gain perspective on everything money can and cannot buy.
Lesson 1: Your money and your life
Introduction
1. What Is Wealth?
2. How You Spend Your Life
3. The Worth of Things
4. How the Economy Works for You, or Not
5. The Economic Reality Today
6. Whose Wallet Are You Carrying?
7. Personal Finances
8. Living Richly
Exercise One
9. Everything Money Cannot Buy
10. Real Freedom
Exercise Two
11. Why It Is Hard to Deal with Money
Introduction
Welcome to the course in Financial Freedom. All of us seek freedom in our lives, and our finances can allow us more freedom, to have or do the things we want in our lives. In this course we will explore the things that money can and cannot buy.
Money is more a philosophy than an exact science, a belief system more than absolute truth, and an area of life which requires intuitive insight even more than analytical ability. The focus of this course is on the beliefs, understanding, perspective, wisdom, and intuitive insights you can bring to your financial situation. We believe that this has value to everyone, regardless of their financial situation, wealth, education, or background.
This course might save you money, but more importantly, it may save you a life misspent. You will not find financial advice here; this course is for the purpose of increasing your awareness and understanding of the way you deal with money in your life. Your own choices and behavior determine your quality of life, more than any external conditions. This course is about making choices that are more true to who you are — which are more progressive and rewarding.
Everyone's financial situation is different. This course is for educational and informational purposes only; it is not meant to replace the advice of a financial professional, nor should anything be construed as personal financial advice. If you need personal financial advice, you can find a financial planner who understands your particular financial and life situation, your needs, your goals, your level of acceptable risk in investing, and so on. In this course you will receive educational information to learn how to have the life you want, but you will not receive any specific financial advice for your unique situation.
Note: The purpose of the course is to make you think, to be more self-aware, to gain perspective, and to learn how to apply universally applicable principles to situations in your own life. What's different about these courses is that there is no "fluff" or stories about other people, no facts to memorize or "top ten" ways to make everything in your life perfect. Be aware, your comfort zone will be challenged. For some, the material may seem like common sense, something you already know but have yet to practice. For others, the realizations you make will be profoundly transformational. As in life, you decide its value to you.
1. What Is Wealth?
Do you know what it means to be wealthy? What is the quality of your life? Do you believe it is dependent upon — or proportional to — the amount of money you have?
Did you know that the word "wealth" originally meant "well-being"? But its meaning has come to be replaced by financial factors, such as money, property, investments, and other assets. We believe in the original meaning and intent of the word wealth, which is well-being or quality of life.
Some things can be better in life with more money, and some things money does little to change. In fact, people who win huge amounts of money from the lottery often experience their lives getting a lot worse — some lives are destroyed by having all that money.
Take a look at the lives of the rich and famous, the media idols, and more often than not you will find a person who has no real sense of self, no inner peace, no true love, and little sense of worth within them — their worth comes from the approval of others. They live lives of desperation, wild highs and lows, alcohol and drug abuse, promiscuity, and egotism. Money enables this behavior.
Quality of life is not equal to quantity of money. We would define quality of life as the experience of peace, love, joy, freedom, self-determination, success, fulfillment, and goodness. None of these requires money; and, more money does not mean more quality of life.
So, if you are not yet rich, be thankful that you do not have this enormous hurdle to get over, before you have any idea what really matters in life, and what does not — before you spend every moment of your life pursuing illusions about what matters.
Money doesn't make you smarter, nor does it come with an operating manual, to tell you how to best use it. A person with an addictive personality or self-destructive behavior, given a lot of money, will use that money to cater to their addictions, illusions, denial, and self-destruction — all the while imagining that they are getting more "free." While they destroy themselves. Think about that.
The use of money requires discernment — the ability to know what is right, good, and true for you; and the willingness to do it. This course is about developing the will to do what is right, not about developing an addiction to money or what money can buy. If you plan to have more money, it is essential to learn how to deal with money in a progressive and life-supporting way.
There are people who have a lot of money, who spend their time making every thing in their life exactly the way they want it to be. They have every door knob and hinge in their homes custom made to their exact specifications. They have every thing to suit their tastes, in their homes, on their yachts, their clothes, everything. And, they imagine their lives are perfect. In fact, they are deluded, having spent their lives making every material object in their life shine — or having their servants do that for them — never realizing that the shine that comes from physical things, no matter how bright and polished and colorful they may be, is not lasting. It is not a true source of happiness or goodness or peace. It doesn't make them any better. It is not real at all.
Realize, a person can have everything in the world, and never know who they are, never know true peace, never know true love, never have a higher purpose in living, never see the light. In fact, the more money people have, the more materialistic their lives, the less likely they are to have any idea what it means to be real, to know the truth within them, or to live with grace. It isn't a question of your money or your life, but how to live the life you truly want and have the money you need — living as your authentic self.
This is a course in learning what it means to be free, not trapped in unending materialistic desires, possessions, hedonism, addictions, illusions, egotism, or power games. Wouldn't that be a better life? Think about it. You need to come to this understanding yourself; the world-at-large caters to every addiction or self-delusive behavior, and prefers you to spend your life — or waste this precious life — unaware, pursuing things which do not matter at all.
It doesn't take a penny to live life gracefully, to find peace, to know what love is, or to have a higher purpose in living. If you are seeking quality of life, you need to know that nothing can keep you from that, unless you insist on looking for it in all the wrong places, or equating it with what money can buy.
2. How You Spend Your Life
Surprisingly, many people do not really question how they are spending their lives. What about you? Have you ever thought that you have a limited time on this Earth, that you will not have today to live over again, that you need to spend your time wisely? Do you just do the things you do each day, habitually, unthinkingly, "involuntarily," out of "necessity"?
Now is when you prepare for later. For the sake of this course, think of your life as a given number of days or years, and be willing to develop a plan to deal with your entire life beginning now. The present is what you take care of, to take care of the future. The present moment is all you have to work with; spend it wisely.
We are not defining freedom in terms of our finances — or outer resources — but rather in terms of what we are able to draw from within us, and experience within us, here, now.
Realize, it doesn't take anything outside you for you to be free within you. And, if you do not find what you need — and are really looking for — within you, it doesn't matter how much you chase after it in the outer world; you will not find it out there. This is the handicap that people with a lot of money have. They are fixated on everything other than simply being who they are — beneath the role they play, beyond their personality, beyond what anyone else thinks or expects of them, beyond what they want or desire or have, beyond every illusion they have cultivated about what is of value and what matters in life.
In our consumer society, people are driven to meet material "needs," and they do pay for them. They pay for them with their lives. What are the choices you are making in your life, today, to be free or to get free? Are "finances" and "freedom" moving in opposition in your life, or are they working together?
The basic financial transaction is: your time and energy — your life — in exchange for money. Realize, this transaction only goes one way: you can certainly spend your life to get money, but it is unlikely that you can spend money to get life.
Whether or not you know anything about money or finances, you are making decisions, at every moment, as to how you are spending your life. Are you moving towards greater freedom, or not? Most people spend their lives getting deeper into obligations, debt, and limitation; few understand what it really means to be free, or experience that.
The most expensive financial transaction you can make is to sell yourself short, to sell out your hopes and dreams, to chase after illusions of what you think will make you happy — to pay for your illusions, and not have true success and financial freedom.
Although this is a course in financial freedom, it is not about how to buy freedom with money. It is about how to be free in all areas of your life. You can do this in terms of work, relationships, and finances. The basis of this course is learning to find and live from that place in you which truly knows what is right, good, and true for you, at each and every moment of your life.
In America, today, thirty-seven million people live in poverty. Tens of millions more live in debt, many without seeing any chance to get out of debt, possibly for the rest of their lives. The average savings of Americans is less than zero. And, many senior citizens who expected to be able to retire are now working minimum wage jobs, to pay the bills.
There is a better way to live, a more creative and progressive way to spend your life, and we are going to show you how. It relies upon you.
People experience problems, suffering, and hardship in their lives, for reasons beyond what they might think or believe. Some live in denial, imagining everything is already taken care of for them, or will be. If they adopt the New Age belief system, and make believe everything is perfect and they can manifest anything they want in their lives because "they are god" — or the "master of the universe" — they tend to feel like all the more a failure when it just doesn't work. If all we had to do was imagine we were rich to be rich, and imagine we were healthy to be healed, the disadvantaged would be millionaires and perfect specimens of health — they hope, and pray, and imagine their entire lives, and yet they do not escape poverty, disease, and oppression. It is not for lack of wanting, or intent.
How many people mistakenly spend their whole lives pursuing some financial goal, or some imagined happiness in retirement, or think that having a goal is the same as being happy, now? How many people proudly, egotistically, fixate upon their material desires, and imagine they will find spiritual reward? How many mistake being lost in the illusions of this world for "success"?
3. The Worth of Things
The value of something is what a person is willing to pay for it, not necessarily what everyone else thinks it is worth. For example, you might have a pink Cadillac that ninety-nine percent of people would not be caught dead in, but which appeals to someone, somewhere, and they will pay a lot for it. Whatever someone pays for it, is what it is worth to them.
Worth is in the eye of the beholder, and it is determined by our social and cultural values more than anything. In a given time or culture, sea shells may be worth more than land, gold, or gemstones. To a drowning person, all the gold bars in the world aren't worth as much as a single life jacket.
Basically, there is no inherent, fixed, or absolute value in anything of this world. Gold has no set value. Oil has no set value. Diamonds have no set value. Cubic zirconium is a man-made gem that is nearly identical to a diamond, and it costs only a tiny percentage of what a diamond does. The value of the diamond is not that it is beautiful, but that it is has been sold by a monopoly which controls demand for diamonds — and their price — out of all proportion to their worth to us. In other words, the value of many things is a matter of how many people can be deprived of that item, so that those who possess it can feel superior in some way — and those who sell it can make a big profit.
Perhaps you can see that the "worth" of things is often determined by ego, controlled markets, supply and demand, and the extent to which others cannot afford or enjoy the same thing. Here's an example. Works of art — originals — can cost hundreds of millions of dollars. You can get an almost exact reproduction painted by an expert artist for a few thousand dollars, and no one but an expert will be able to tell the difference. The difference in worth has nothing to do with the beauty of the painting, but rather the fact that no one else can enjoy the original painting unless the owner lets them. Many works of art are kept in storage, or held as investments, without anyone being able to appreciate them, because the less access there is to the work the more people tend to want it.
Do you imagine that people only want "the real thing"? Desire is, in our society, most often a programmed, manipulated, and artificially created "need" for things that we have no real need for. Coca Cola has been marketed for decades as "the real thing," and so many people have fallen for that marketing campaign that it is now drunk more than water. It has replaced the real thing with flavored sugar water. And it is the biggest selling, most widely recognized, product in the world. People in countries where they cannot afford clothes manage to buy Coca Cola so that they can have the illusion that they have truly arrived in the modern world. Their self-worth is dictated by their soft drink.
Nothing sells like illusions in our society. If you can make someone believe that something has value, you can get them to pay for it. They will trade their life energy — their life and their work — to obtain it. And they will believe they are getting their money's worth. You would be amazed at all the products and services — everything from unnecessary medical operations to tax write-offs to university degrees to breast implants to caskets — that are sold this way, by selling illusions.
Some of the most profitable businesses on this planet cater to humanity's greatest weaknesses and delusions: including addictions, violence, sex, disease, escapism, and war. Pornography is a multi-billion dollar business, gambling is a multi-billion dollar business, alcohol is a multi-billion dollar business, tobacco is a multi-billion dollar business, video games are a multi-billion dollar business, fashion is a multi-billion dollar business, cosmetics are a multi-billion dollar business, drugs are a multi-billion dollar business, sports are a multi-billion dollar business, movies are a multi-billion dollar business, war is a multi-billion dollar business, religion is a multi-billion dollar business, and so on. People will pay anything for their illusions and addictions, to feel good, as if that makes everything good. Then, they happily go about living a life without purpose, value, meaning, creativity, love, understanding, compassion, or peace.
Realize, the true worth of something is how much it leads us to what is most right, good, and true for us — our highest good. The more it does that, the more its true worth. The less it does that — or the more it caters to our illusions or self-destructiveness or addictiveness — the less it is really worth.
In this world, everything is for sale, from advertising space on our foreheads to advertising space in urinals to advertising space painted on buses. Everything is for sale, everything is advertised, and we are bombarded with messages about what we should want or buy, constantly, in all the media, and just walking down the street. This advertising creates artificial needs, artificial demand, artificial consumption, and an artificial value for just about everything. How much are the most trendy fashions from a couple of years ago worth today? You'd have a hard time giving them away.
Remember, the worth of everything is transient. Even the worth of money itself changes over time. Due to inflation, what a dollar could purchase ten years ago is a lot more than it can buy today; and what a dollar can buy today will probably be a lot less than what it buys in ten years. It looks like the same dollar, and it may actually be the same dollar bill, but it is worth a different amount all of the time. The thing to realize, is that if you do not take steps to increase your own financial worth, the decreasing value of the dollar will rob you of your savings over time. It isn't enough to save; you have to learn what to do with your money, to have it actually be there for you when you need it in the future.
4. How The Economy Works for You, or Not
Do you know how the economy works? Do you know that your own financial situation is a microcosm of the larger economic system in which you live? The problems or challenges you may experience do not take place in a vacuum; they are inherent in the system in which we live.
Our economic system is built upon illusions.
Most people's lives in America are built on money they do not have. The US government has about $50 trillion in unfunded liabilities; US consumers have over $10 trillion in outstanding debt. This money is owed by all of us. What this means is, we live in a nation that is built upon money it simply does not have. Those who have wealth and power (the "haves") enrich themselves at the expense of the "have nots." The have nots tend to be financially illiterate, fiscally irresponsible, and enslaved to debt, as will be future generations who inherit this debt. The haves use debt to make more money; the have nots do not escape the trap of living in debt, and ultimately have less. Young people especially expect to have a higher income in the future, and use this excuse to run up a lot of debt now; for many, this is a recipe for financial disaster.
In the US, the top one percent of society has over sixty percent of the wealth of the nation. It is a lot like this around the world. Even in countries that were once proudly communistic, where the ideology declared that everyone was equal and equally entitled to share in the rewards of production in their society, there were always the privileged few who held power, who controlled the wealth, who had luxurious vacation homes, chauffeur-driven limousines, mistresses, otherwise unobtainable luxury goods, and so on. And it is even more of a class system today.
The sharing of wealth is only a myth, whether in democratic or communistic countries. Today, in democratic, free-market Russia, two thirds of the nation lives in poverty; prostitution, drug use, AIDS, crime, and corruption are common. In the "free-market" Russian economy, a small number of people are incredibly rich, and live in the heights of luxury and privilege. There are even billionaires in Russia now, while everyone else suffers in despair. The gap between the haves and the have nots is growing, not just in Russia, but in the United States. The rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer in America, too. Democracy does not mean sharing of wealth.
You might imagine that a "free-market economy," where everyone is entitled to get all they can get for themselves, would provide some sort of greater equality, freedom, or financial opportunity for everyone. Especially in a democracy. But you would be mistaken. The way every economy in this world is set up, the privileged few have all the real power and wealth, and everyone else only has either a dream or an illusion of being well off.
In the United States we live in a consumer society, an economy that is based upon debt. That is becoming the norm throughout the world. In the US, the economy would collapse — the entire financial system would fall apart, and money would be worthless overnight — if people did not continue to spend money that they do not have. It has become the American way. Banks and other financial institutions, and retailers, offer credit to consumers so that they can purchase what they cannot afford. They make money on the interest that people pay, above the actual purchase price.
Debt is a vicious cycle. People are kept enslaved to usurious interest rates, not just on credit cards, but on so-called "payday loans," where a person can wind up paying five hundred percent interest per year — that's five times the amount they borrowed, which they have to pay in interest. People with credit cards charging rates of nearly thirty percent — which is common — make only the minimum payment each month, paying only the interest, and may take many years to pay off their debts. In many cases, when they are paying only the minimums, there is no hope of ever getting out of debt, because interest just keeps accumulating every months.
Countless millions of people live like this in our society. In many cases it begins as soon as they are no longer minors, or begin college. Credit cards are thrown at them, when they have no idea how to handle their finances, and so they buy whatever they want, with money they don't have, with little or no income, and enter a live of financial bondage. These are generally productive members of society; they graduate, have enormous consumer and student-loan debts, and it takes forever for them to ever get free financially, if at all.
So, there are those who live in poverty, those who live in debt, and those who are free of debt — who are a very small minority. The idea is to get out of debt, learn to handle finances properly, and gain more financial freedom. And, millions of people of all ages need to learn how to do this, from eighteen-year olds to senior citizens who cannot make ends meet or who have nothing put aside for retirement.
Whether you have money or not, you need to learn how to deal with life, all of its stresses and pressures, and take care of yourself as best you can. You cannot depend upon anyone else — including the government — to do this for you. If you think life is hard when you have money, imagine what it is like when you don't, or when a sudden medical expense or disappearing pension fund or job cut causes you to lose everything. It happens every day.
People counting on Social Security to be there when they retire need to know that the Social Security fund is going to disappear sometime in the future. It is not being replenished at the rate at which it is being drained by benefit payouts, and at some point it will go away. So will Medicare. The entire economy runs on debt — with an overall deficit of hundreds of billions of dollars every year — and unpaid debt eventually becomes insolvent. There simply is no future in relying upon ever-growing debt, and it will impact the quality of our lives, more and more, each year. It may happen gradually, unnoticed for a while, or it can happen dramatically.
A couple of decades ago, when Reaganomics brought us the "trickle down theory" of economics, and the rich began to get very rich, the elderly began to eat cat food, because that was all they could afford. Now, many senior citizens have to work minimum-wage jobs just to get by. With the present high cost of living, it is very hard to get by on Social Security. In the future, it will be nearly impossible. Think about this. How do you wish to spend your "golden years"? And, how is your present situation working for your future?
5. The Economic Reality Today
If there is one thing you can be sure of, it is that everything changes, and everything is changing at an accelerating rate. Nowhere is this more the case than in financial matters. The economic reality we face today is vastly different from that of the past, and even yesterday.
70% of our economy today is made up of consumer spending. The entire economy depends on consumer spending, and so nearly every message you get in the media encourages you to spend money. You get very few messages — and almost no information — about how to not spend your money, how to invest, how to have a secure financial future, rather than living in ever increasing debt.
Today, the US is a country where people spend more than they earn, get out of school with as much as hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, are increasingly priced out of the housing market, face job loss to overseas competitors, are often hired at less than full-time so that employers do not have to give them any benefits at all (including health insurance), do not have secure retirement funds or plans, suffer from increasing rates of illness (especially due to overweight, diabetes, heart disease, and so on), have a dozen or more credit cards, have negative savings, do not understand the concept of (or practice) saving and investing, are increasingly materialistic and hedonistic, divorce at a high rate, face the prospect of disappearing Social Security and Medicare, and often need to have two jobs just to make ends meet.
This is a very different picture than existed fifty years ago in the US. And, it takes a very different approach to handling our finances to ensure our future. Fifty years ago, people spent a much smaller percentage of their income. They had less expenses in proportion to their income, and they saved more. They put a much larger down payment on a home, and took a mortgage for a much shorter period of time. The revolving credit of countless credit cards was nonexistent. People knew what it meant to live within their means, and did not spend money which they did not have — that which can now be borrowed on credit cards, and with installment loans for things such as automobiles.
In terms of buying power, ownership, and quality of life, it is generally agreed that things are getting worse, not better. People had a higher quality of life in the past than they do now. And, in general, people will have a worse quality of life in the future than they do today. That is the trend, and the economic reality. Today, people may work three jobs just to make ends meet.
The gap between the rich and the poor is increasing every year — the rich are getting much richer, and the poor are getting poorer. And the middle class is increasingly in debt. What this means is that the vast majority of people who work for a living are doing worse, daily. Their money has less purchasing power each year, due to inflation. And, even if they manage to put some money in the bank, to save, it too decreases in value each year — the interest paid by the savings institution is less than the typical rate of inflation. If you merely save money at a bank, it will lose almost all of its purchasing power over the course of decades, to be worth less (almost "worthless") when you retire.
Most financial advice of yesterday does not apply today, regardless of all the experts and authorities who are invested in the past — financially, emotionally, and intellectually — or past trends. If you have a reasonable degree of awareness, and self-directedness, you learn to question authority. Why? Because the experts and authorities are often the last to realize what is really happening. They see through the filter of the past — especially their past programming, conditioning, and education — rather than having a simple awareness of the here and now.
In order to effectively deal with the here and now, you have to be "present" here and now. You need awareness, and you need some basic understanding of the way things are, and the way they are probably going to be. None of this is really learned in our education.
We are going to look at a variety of financial and non-financial aspects of life, to allow you to develop the awareness and basic understanding to succeed, prosper, and secure your future as best you can. We do not claim to be able to make people millionaires — that most popular marketing approach in all popular publications and courses — is waving an illusion in front of people's eyes. We will not disrespect you, or your intelligence, in that way.
What we will do, is show you how to get control of your finances and balance that aspect of your life with all the other important areas. Life is a whole, and it is not possible to separate the financial aspect of your life from your work, relationships, health, emotions, understanding, social or cultural values, and spiritual nature. Even when we discuss money, finance, or the economy, the idea is to place it all in the larger context of your whole life. Only then, can it truly make sense to you.
Finally, we will challenge your beliefs as well as the popular perspectives on these areas — not to confront you, or to try to prove that we are right and others are not. But to give you the space in which to have a different perspective, see what you think, and consider how to best pursue your options. There is no single formula that works for everyone, today. There is no guarantee of greater success or profit. All we can do is to help to educate or inform you, so that you can take the steps necessary to get further information, professional financial advice, and support in your own unique situation. Anyone who offers a system that "works for everyone," or an investment strategy that is guaranteed to make you a millionaire, is just deluding you.
You have to use your own awareness, inner wisdom, common sense, and intelligence, to explore what is right for you. Do not take anything at face value, least of all get-rich-quick schemes or financial advisors (salespeople). Learn to make wise financial decisions for yourself — accepting personal responsibility — and discover how to move forward more confidently into the future, today. For many people, that means you cannot just do what you did yesterday, with your money today, and hope that everything will turn out okay. You have to be wiser than that.
6. Whose Wallet Are You Carrying?
A popular series of commercials asks what credit card you are carrying in your wallet. We will ask a more fundamental question: whose wallet are you carrying?
Before you can understand how to be financially free, you need to see precisely how you are not free. And one of those ways relates to your wallet. You imagine it is your wallet. After all, you bought it or perhaps received it as a gift; and you surely own it. It's yours. But the money in it isn't really yours. You are basically leasing wallet space, which you fill with money, and then someone else gets to take that money out of your wallet. It's really someone else's money.
How can that be?
Americans have negative savings; they owe more money than they have. They are living on borrowed money, on debt. The things you buy on credit aren't really yours. Your home isn't yours; your car isn't yours — at least not until they are fully paid for, and you have no debt whatsoever. If you have more money going out than coming in, none of the money that temporarily fills your wallet is really yours. You're just holding it, temporarily, making believe it's yours, until you have to give to whomever you owe money to. It's really their money, all along. You only make believe it's yours, for a while. Of course, this is just a metaphor, but it holds a lot of truth about the way we live in our society, today.
Maybe you haven't purchased a house. Even then, you have likely signed a lease, which means you owe the full amount of the lease, most likely payable monthly. You have signed an agreement that has put you in debt for the full amount of the lease. The money you earn until the lease is paid in full, which needs to go towards rent, is not really yours. You just get to sign it over to its rightful owner. And if you don't give them their money, you won't have a place to live.
When you live in debt, you basically lease wallet space, and yet imagine you really have that money to spend, that it is yours. Credit card companies (banks) even send their customers cash advance checks — blank checks — that they can write for thousands of dollars, and their customers imagine that it is really their money.
In reality, they haven't earned it, and it isn't really theirs. And, they are unlikely to get out of debt or pay it back anytime soon. Banks are counting on that, so that they can keep earning interest without you ever paying off your debts. You feel so entitled to that money, so deserving of everything. And, if companies are throwing money at you, well, who are you to say no. Well, that is exactly what you need to say: No. Of course, then you don't get to buy all the things you desire but can't afford — as if that is a bad thing.
Americans are highly programmed consumers; they want what they want when they want it, the sooner the better. And those who provide goods and services want to remove any hesitation you might have toward buying from them — and that includes getting you to impulse buy, buy beyond your means, buy what you do not really need but only desire, and disregard the quiet voice of conscience. In fact, in so many stores, there is incessant loud music to make sure you cannot hear yourself think, and you cannot hear that little voice that says, "You can't afford this," or "You don't really need this." All the while, your ego feels like it is being served, like you are getting everything you deserve — and in reality you are digging yourself into a financial pit.
So, you walk around with a wallet. And the money that goes into does not accrue to you. Someone else gets all of it. If you tell yourself that's just how you buy something, or that's the way things work, you are believing a lie. And living a lie. That may be how things are, but that doesn't mean that's the way they should be. There is a better way to live.
And, it begins with actually owning your own wallet, paying yourself first, and getting out of debt.
This is what Americans, and those around the world who are adopting American values, must realize. Debt isn't freeing them, it is destroying them. The common financial programming means that someone else is profiting by disadvantaging or exploiting you. And, you are already greatly programmed by your society; your behavior may seem to be "free" but it is within very narrow and self-limiting constraints.
7. Personal Finances
Is your financial life out of control? Do you spend more than you earn? Are you hoping to win the lottery to solve your financial problems? In this course, you are going to learn how to get control of your finances, how to spend your money and how not to spend your money, and how to get ahead. You can learn how to reduce debt, how to have positive savings, how to have a greater net worth, how to create or add value and make money, how to draw upon your own wisdom to make the best financial decisions. You can also learn how to avoid the most common financial pitfalls, or how to get out of them if you've fallen into them.
We've going to take the magic out of money, and get real. We want you to be conscious of what you are doing financially, including when you are spending money. And, rather than hearing that programming in your head that tells you "You deserve this," whatever you want to buy, we are going to ask you to listen to the quieter voice of conscience. For many, this is an entirely new approach to finances. Their thinking may change from: "I don't really care what it costs. I can buy whatever I want; it's a free society. Everyone else does," to "You mean, I really have to pay for all this stuff one of these days? Maybe I don't need this right now."
This is a course about a lot more than money. If life was only about money, and if having money solved all of our problems, we'd be the first to tell you that. But it isn't. So, we're going to help you to gain perspective, and learn how to have the things that money can't buy, too.
Credit cards are (false) promises of fulfillment. One credit card company advertises that there are some things money can't buy, but for everything else there is their card; another says that life demands their card. There was a time when people would have to hand over real gold or silver coins to purchase things, and there was a clear exchange of value. Then bank notes — paper which is not backed by anything real — replaced that. Now, plastic is replacing paper. They've made spending so easy for you — you become divorced from the consequences of your actions. Spending money has become so abstract, so intangible, that people have no idea what they are really doing. It is like magic: you just walk into a store, wave a piece of plastic, and they give you anything you want.
In our society, today, people are addicted to shopping. It is a serious addiction. Whenever they feel upset or anxious or unhappy, they go and buy something, especially clothing, something to make them feel better. They may never wear those clothes, or use what they buy, but it is the act of buying that reassures them that everything is okay in their world. This is called living in denial. Some people rush off to buy something to cover up the pain of realizing the truth about how they are living their life. Just go to any mall, and you'll see people buying everything they don't really need. It's an addiction.
There is a better way to live, and we are going to show you how. You will need to learn to think differently, choose differently, and act differently. It may be hard, particularly if you are thoroughly programmed by your consumer society, if you take your sense of worth from the material world — things you buy — rather than from who you truly are, within you. If you have no idea who you really are, or where you need to be making choices from, in your life, you will find it of value to explore the course in Managing Your Self. It is more basic that you learn to manage your self first, before you can properly manage your money. That's how to get the best value from this course.
This course in Financial Freedom isn't a bunch of New Age mumbo-jumbo; it's not about "the universe" providing for your every need and desire; it's not about "attracting" money; it isn't about developing a "millionaire mind"; it isn't about how to live in "abundance"; it isn't even about getting rich. It's about living the highest quality of life you can. We cannot guarantee wealth, health, wisdom, creativity, purpose, or prosperity in your life. But you can learn how to get control of your finances, and make choices that are more true to you, more progressive and forward-looking.
Countless millions of people imagine that if they balance their checkbook, or spend as much as (or a bit more than) what they earn, then they are living a financially secure and responsible life. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Financial freedom and quality of life are a choice you make; and that needs to be an informed, conscious choice. Personal finances are a lot more than a matter of figuring out how to pay for everything you want; you need to know what you are buying and why. Understand what money means to you, personally.
8. Living Richly
What if you had all the money you wanted?
How much would that be? Why?
Would you want even more?
What would you do?
Where would you be?
What would you spend your money on?
In what way would the world be a better place, if you were rich?
Exercise One: Relax, close your eyes, take a deep breath and let it out slowly. Picture in your mind, having all the money you could ever want. Picture yourself with all of that money, and see what you would do with it. How would your life change? See yourself doing it, in your mind. When you feel you are done, you can open your eyes.
Did you rush off to buy all the things that would make you happy?
Did you see yourself enjoying luxuries, and all the expensive things money can buy?
How far did you go, in your mind? Did you cater to your large or small addictions in life?
Did you have a chance to prove something to someone, about your worth?
Who else benefited from your having all that money? How?
Of all the things you could see yourself doing, which were the ones that were clearly right, good, and true for you? Which were the ones that weren't clearly right, good, or true for you? How do you know the difference?
If you had a lot of money, would you be willing to do only what you felt was right and good for you?
The richest people have more money than they will ever spend in their lives, no matter how many homes, vehicles, private jets, or worldly possessions they may have. So, what does it all mean? What does it mean to be rich?
Does a person stop wanting — stop feeling lack — when they are rich? Not really.
Do people stop being afraid of losing their wealth — or dying — when they are rich? Not really.
Do the richest people live longer then those who are not rich, or have better health? Not really.
Do rich people have greater intelligence, wisdom, wit, creativity, or understanding? Not really.
Do rich people have more love, compassion, concern for others? Not really.
Rich people just have more money, more material resources, a greater financial worth. That's it. They are not better human beings. They are not more loving, more at peace, or ultimately happier. And, they certainly don't cheat death, no matter how much money they have. Often, the more they have the more they want — the more they feel they lack, like an addiction.
So, why is it that so many people have the goal to be rich? Why do they imagine they will be better off? We are programmed that way by our society, with its endless images of wealth and excess, its billionaire ratings, its offering of credit to buy what we cannot afford, and its illusions that a hedonistic or materialistic life is the best life. And people dream of wealth because in reality they are generally slaves to debt, and can only dream of getting free.
People desire to satisfy their unfulfilled desires. They imagine that satisfying their desires will give them some greater fulfillment. Does it? Not really. But the illusion that riches will give us everything we want is sold and promoted and crafted throughout our lives, by those who would like us to keep our focus on the outer material world rather than our inner spiritual being. They profit by our illusions. Desire is unending.
There was a time when you could buy a Model T automobile in any color you wanted, as long as it was black. Now, you can buy a car in countless styles and colors and models. And, you can have the illusion that because you have the latest and the newest and the "best" options available, you finally have what you need. But, really, what is all that different about buying a car today and buying one when they first were made? Do you imagine it is a greater thrill today? Is it more liberating today? Or, is it just another ego rush, which ultimately doesn't mean all that much in terms of your ultimate happiness? All you need to see is a child with a bicycle to realize that you aren't getting anywhere near as much joy and sense of freedom from your expensive car as a child does from their bike.
It has less to do with the worldly objects your ego gets fixated upon, than it does your capacity to connect with your inner joy, freedom, peace, love, and fulfillment. Sadly, many people basically "are" their car; they so identify with it, choose it to match their ego or personality, customize it, or have a sense of belonging in it. But, that is only an illusion. Regardless of the color or style, or how much you paid for it, or how much you love it, it isn't you. Nothing you have is you.
Living richly has nothing to do with what you have, but what you experience, inside. All of the value, worth, and meaning comes from within you. Living richly is not about spending money at all. It is about appreciating the fullness and richness of your inner life, your inner being, who you truly are, and the joy that you can find within you. Money cannot buy any of that.
Think about that, deeply. The joy you find in a ten dollar meal is not necessarily any less than what a person finds in a thousand dollar meal. It is about your own sense of taste, your own appreciation, and so on. It has nothing whatsoever to do with money. Only the ego feels "good" when it spends a lot of money, because it gets to feel superior (which it is not); pretty soon a thousand dollar meal isn't lavish or stimulating enough, and the ego goes off in search of something more expensive or pretentious. And, of course, it never has enough.
This why people who have a lot of money are not any happier than those who do not. Yes, it is important to get out of poverty, debt, and lack; but being rich is not a prerequisite or guarantee of happiness. Often, the more someone may have, the more they feel they have to lose.
There are rich people with countless millions or billions of dollars, who have houses that could provide living space for a small town, who have expensive wine collections in their cellars with tens of thousands of bottles, who have homes filled with priceless antiques and collections from all over the world, who have more cars than some taxi companies, who attend the most exclusive country clubs and dinner parties, who have private jets to take them anywhere they want to go, who think nothing of spending ten thousand dollars for lunch or a hotel room for the night. They imagine all of this is getting them somewhere, when, in reality, it is getting them nowhere at all.
People often spend their entire lives chasing after one thing or another that they imagine will give them that ultimate fulfillment they seek — without ever finding it within them. Living richly is about living in a place of love, peace, joy, goodness, and Light, right here, right now. All of that is a matter of what is within you, not anything outside you.
9. Everything Money Cannot Buy
What if you could have what you really wanted, and it didn't take a lot of money? Wouldn't it be kind of a waste to spend your whole life looking for it, trying to buy it, or imagining it will be there in the future when you have a certain amount of money, when you could have it right here, right now? We think so.
Consider all the things that money cannot buy, and be sure that you are not planning on having them some day when you have enough money; otherwise, you may never really have them at all. Because, people never have enough money. Just ask any billionaire. We will get around to talking about money, and how to perhaps have more of it. But, first, we are going to continue to get some perspective on the big picture.
These are some of the things that money cannot buy (but which it can often subvert): love, peace, honesty, respect, creativity, understanding, wisdom, purpose, fulfillment, higher consciousness, spiritual attainment or realization, release from karma or suffering, freedom from negativity or evil, or divine grace. All the money in the world cannot get a dog to love you, if it does not. And the "love" you imagine you get from others — especially when you are rich — may be little more than kissing up to you.
Money cannot buy love. It can buy sex, and even marriages which pretend to be about love are often just about being seduced by sex, selfishness, mutual ambition, and the pretense of love. Money can buy all of those illusions about your worth, but all the money in the world cannot buy true love. Love is priceless.
Money cannot buy peace. It can buy a degree of security, it can put up walls or what appear to be impenetrable boundaries against what might disrupt peace, but it cannot buy peace. All the money in the world cannot make this a peaceful world, a peaceful nation, a peaceful society, a peaceful city, a peaceful family, or a peaceful person. Peace is priceless.
Money cannot buy honesty, understanding, or wisdom. It can buy information, but information is not understanding; and, all the money in the world cannot buy honesty. Billionaires are not honest, not even with themselves; they live in a world of egotism and materialism. Money can help you live a life that is a lie, but it does not give you truth or wisdom. Wisdom is priceless.
Money cannot buy purpose, fulfillment, creativity, or higher consciousness. It can pay for the creative works of others, or the satisfaction of never-ending worldly desires, or create an illusion of purpose. But it cannot produce higher consciousness, higher purpose, or fulfillment of a person's true purpose in living. That higher consciousness or purpose is priceless.
Money cannot buy spiritual attainment or realization, or divine grace. It can pay for endless illusions, endless worldly ambitions and delusions, but it cannot buy anything of the spirit. A person who has traded divine Grace for anything of the world — or the entire world — has sold a diamond for the price of spinach. The Highest Good, spiritual realization, and release from all that brings us suffering in life, is priceless.
Money can get you your favorite brand of beer, a bigger television, yet another car, friends who tell you what you want to hear, and the security of a comfort zone which you never leave — so you can sit back with a beer in your hand, in front of the big screen, watching your life go down the drain. Millions of people have made that deal. And they haven't got a clue what true fulfillment, true love, true purpose, true peace, true happiness, true freedom, true grace, or their Highest Good really is.
Be aware if you have any illusions about how you will someday have what you want, only after you have a lot of money. Are you making excuses for living without love, peace, purpose, and so on? Or do you have them in your life, now? That is the foundation upon which you need to build, here, now. It is not the goal. Do not imagine it can be purchased with money.
The idea is to learn to have, experience, and live from a place of deeper contentment, within you, rather than create from a place of lack. Nothing money can buy can fill a lack within you.
10. Real Freedom
If you wish to have financial freedom, you need to know what freedom itself is. Money is not freedom. Freedom is a state of mind, and a spiritual realization.
In a larger sense, few of us are truly free; we all experience and live within various boundaries and limitations. We are subject to self-negating influences merely because we are living in this world. For most people, everything they know has come from their society — outside themselves — and it does not free them as much as it entraps them in expectations, demands, pressures, stress, and the accumulation of debt.
There is a big difference between being free, and imagining you are free when you have been trained to accept enslavement, especially financially. We cannot emphasize this enough: most people walk around in a dream, thinking they are free because they can choose which brand of beer they prefer, the size of their TV screen, or the color of their car. They think that is freedom. In reality, they are enslaved by debt and facing a retirement with absolutely no financial security. Really, how "free" is that? Are they going to imagine they are free when they are homeless, lose work, are living on the street, or begging for handouts from others? That is not our idea of freedom.
You have not been prepared for life — for freedom, success, and fulfillment — by your education. You been prepared for defeat, programmed to think like everyone else, to accept all that oppresses you. Have you learned to succeed on your own, or have you ultimately been taught to fail in the "real world"? Can you step out, beyond the boundaries of what you may have already learned, or been taught or told, and really be free?
Exercise Two: Answer honestly (you may wish to write out your response):
"I am free because ..."
"I am not free because ..."
Think about it, what does being free mean to you, personally?
Having money is not a way to avoid the consequences of our actions; it is not — or should not be — a means to avoid responsibility. That is not true freedom. Freedom is about making choices in the present moment that free us now and in the future, as opposed to choices that bring us down.
You have a choice, at each and every moment, to do what brings you to a place of true, lasting fulfillment, or not. Financially, most people put off that choice; they prefer not to make tough choices today, believing that the future will take care of itself. That illusion of being "free" now, limits and diminishes our financial future.
You can choose to use the money that comes to you wisely, and learn what it means to have your money working for you over time, to generate an income stream. Financial freedom includes having a positive cash flow (more money coming in than going out) and a positive net worth (more assets than liabilities). You can choose to spend less than you earn, and put the remainder into savings and investments. And you can learn to have income-producing assets — such as investments or a business, which makes money for you, and which will continue to do so after you retire.
Real freedom — a true state of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual freedom — is necessary for financial freedom. If you are not free, as a person, you will have a hard time being financially free. Images of "success" portrayed in the media almost always involve egotism, materialism, excess, lack of ethics or morality, alcohol, drugs, and degenerate lifestyles. In this way, people use their money self-destructively; and the more they have, the less free they become.
If you have any kind of addiction (or dependence), large or small, and it takes money to pay for your habit, you may be facing a future of financial bondage. Gambling, drugs, alcohol, pornography, shopping, and so on, can drain whatever money comes to you. There is little point in earning more money, or trying to build wealth, if it is going to go right down the drain.
There is a place in you which knows what is right, good, and true for you. If you learn to come from that place — your inner conscience, that place inside where you are empowered to do what is right, good, and true for you — you can add financial savvy to that. But, if you don't come from that place, no amount of financial savvy can bring you to that place.
11. Why It Is Hard to Deal with Money
From the earliest age, we are programmed by our society, and those closest to us, to have a wrong relationship with money. Children today engage in a popular online "game" which trains them to live in a virtual world, which they fill with every materialistic item money can buy. In this game, they are trained to be consumers, with the belief that money will let them purchase everything they want or need in life — and their self-image and self-esteem is based upon what they can buy. How many parents already give children that message in real life?
That erroneous programming, which is reinforced in the tens of thousands of advertising messages we are exposed to every year, causes the typical person to believe their programming rather than the truth. External promises of satisfaction, gratification, and fulfillment replace the real inner experience of fulfillment. The artificial "need" for ever-greater buying behavior — based in a feeling of lack — is never truly satisfied no matter how much we buy.
About fifteen million Americans have a shopping addiction. Shopping isn't just shopping, it is a behavior that is wired into their brains, which changes the chemistry and wiring of their brains. For a shopping addict, the "need" to shop is irresistible, because they feel better when they shop; their brains produce the chemicals associated with the pleasure receptors of addiction. They feel bad if they don't shop; they feel better the more they buy, the more expensive, exciting, or impulsive the purchase. And, usually, they don't really need what they buy.
Every day we are exposed to false advertising messages, which, over time, tend to be accepted as "true." We are falsely promised "freedom" when we get a new credit card. Images of smiling people who are enjoying shopping, who seem to be so very happy and fulfilled, encourage Americans to sign up for dozens of credit cards, all the while imagining they are getting more "free" while they are getting more enslaved to debt, like an addiction.
The problem is, addictions feel good; and whatever the addiction, using drugs, alcohol, gambling, pornography, or shopping, the person physiologically feels good — better when they are doing what is wrong and destructive, than when they are not.
The fundamental, erroneous, financial programming of our modern society is: debt is good for you. Our entire economy runs on debt now. It wasn't always this way. The more dependent the economy is upon debt, the more powerful, subtle, and pervasive the programming to spend money. Children are exposed to these messages in school, on television, in movies, and on the Internet. Their peers worship labels and brands, and all the most worthless external signs of social "success."
As we grow up, we don't think twice about running up debt in our lives. That's the way it is; that's what everyone does. Well, no. Each of us, individually, has to take control of our own lives — our own thinking, our feelings, our desires, our needs, our spending, and our debt. We have to step out of the popular programming to fail, financially. We have already been programmed to fail, in terms of our health, emotions, finances, and even spiritually. It is easier to fail than to succeed.
Millions of Americans have been through bankruptcy; many millions more live on minimum wage; millions live in poverty; millions live with debts they will have for many years.
Money isn't just about money. It is about your choices and behavior in life, and what you believe is acceptable. The seductive power of money tells you that you deserve what you want just because you want it — not if you can afford it, not if it is really right and good for you. Money caters to that seductive illusion of power, which is actually a weakness.
Until you learn to choose what is right, good, and true for you, you remain enslaved to what is not. This is why getting a one-time stock tip will not solve your problems; just making a budget or watching where every penny goes will not solve your problems; neither will winning the lottery. The real problem is on a much more fundamental level than that — and so is the solution. It is about how you choose to live, from a place of true power or from a place of habit, limitations, and weakness.
We are no longer born free in America. We inherit a system of debt — trillions of dollars of debt being run up by our society — and live within an oppressive, self-destructive financial system. And, it doesn't matter how much money we make; if we have any addictive tendencies, if we are materialistic or hedonistic, if we are addicted to living beyond our means, we will never get ahead, never have a secure future for ourselves. If you do not know how to manage your self, you will have a very hard time managing your money. The course in Managing Your Self can help you find a place to stand within yourself, to deal with life with much greater self-control.
This course in Financial Freedom is a chance to gain greater awareness, learn how to make more progressive choices for the long term, and free yourself from the oppressive financial situation you may have been born into, fallen into, or created for yourself. It is not about short-lived investment tips.