“Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value.”
– “Francisco’s Money Speech” from Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged
Cover photo by pixabay.com, CC0
Money is nothing more than a medium of exchange, a way for people to store and trade the value of their work for other goods and services. Why write an entire article about this simple statement? Because everything that one needs to know about building wealth requires having the right mindset, and the right mindset rests in part on that statement. Far too few people understand this definition of money, and this missing piece of knowledge is working against their ability to build wealth. How can we build our knowledge about wealth without laying the proper foundation?
Over time, the idea of acquiring money has been linked with greed and selfishness. This mistrust of money as both an idea and as a commodity goes back, way back, to at least the New Testament when Saint Paul wrote to Timothy, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.”
Two thousand years after Paul’s letter, the idea of money is still being fought and anguished over. The 1980’s movie Wall Street became radically famous, and equally as controversial, even despised, for a speech given by one of its characters, Gordon Gekko. Gekko, who embodies the desire to create value and build personal wealth, argued in front of a crowd that, “the point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed — for lack of a better word — is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms — greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge — has marked the upward surge of mankind.”
Today, the anti-money sentiment has worked its way into every corner of society, even fashion. The “hipster look”, at the time of this writing, currently sits on the pinnacle of this sentiment. People pay unbelievable sums of money for wardrobes that make them look poor while still being fashionable. They wear these outfits while half-consuming specialty coffee drinks that cost more than what an actual poor person earns in wages for an hour of his work.
If you don’t believe the extent of how deeply entrenched this anti-money sentiment has become, try this little experiment. Tell some random strangers that you interact with that you grew up dirt poor and then converse with them about life’s struggles. Then tell others that you grew up in a wealthy neighborhood and talk about life. Notice how differently people react to the knowledge of your economic status and the empathy they show when discussing your struggles.
The journey to building wealth is a difficult one. Along the way, people will question you and your motives. “Why do you need that much money? Why don’t you just give it to people who need it more than you? Must be nice to be that lucky, huh?” You’ll get lazy and reduce your contributions to your 401(k). You’ll take a break from your most profitable and difficult skill to “do meaningful work.” Sand will be dumped in the gears of your money machine, and it is up to you to keep it running.
Every day you must stay focused on the actions and steps that will make you wealthy. Keep at the forefront of your mind that money is only obtained by exchanging things of value. If you want more of it, you must create more valuable goods and services for other people. Don’t make excuses to yourself or to others about why wanting more money is a problem. The ability to pick up your car keys on a whim, load up the kids, drive to the desert, and show them how to photograph the star-filled galaxy at night requires money. An oceanfront home where you can wake up to the sound of crashing waves isn’t going to be handed to you.
Treat the idea of money with the respect it deserves. Money, in all of its forms, comes from creating value for people. Work on that, and you’ll have a solid start to wealth building.