#189 - Beliefs about money...
And murder
Belief about money
I listened to a coaching conversation the other day where the client’s beliefs about money came under examination. It reminded me of my old self.
I grew up skeptical of money. Money can change people. Worse, it can change you. For the worse. This is what I absorbed from those around me. Growing up in a small town in India before the benefits of economic liberalization made an appearance, this mindset was common.
It went something like this: Money is evil. There’s no straight way to make money. By association, people who are rich are evil.
This sometimes played out like this.
❌If you are rich and you flaunt your wealth, you’re evil because you’re proud about your ill-gotten wealth.
❌If you are rich and live frugally, you’re no less evil because you aren’t sharing it with those less fortunate.
There’s no redemption if you’re rich. No wonder I didn’t have any rich-and-not-crooked role models growing up.
Left unexamined, such a childhood belief can produce tremendous resistance later on. It may manifest itself as an unease about money. “I want to make money but I feel guilty about it,” you may say. Now this, no matter who you are, you may have heard many times in your life. This is socially acceptable. What may it conceal at a deeper level?
“I have a problem with rich people” OR “I have a problem with rich people who don’t give enough.” This feels less acceptable. You won’t hear many say this. Yet, the root belief between people who say “I’ve a problem with making money” AND those who say “I’ve a problem with rich people who don’t give” is more shared than unique.
In the conversation I listened to, the client had a similar negative association with money. Making money would make her rich, and she was afraid being rich would change her for the worse. For the worse—why? What if it was not true? What evidence did she have that she would become a worse person with more money? She paused and thought.
Once she was able to use these questions to examine her assumptions, she was able to pick up a new frame for herself. She could look at money as something that would allow her to give more to the causes she believed in. She spoke about this well in her village that was being crowdfunded. It was short of its target by a lakh and she imagined how much joy it would give her to be able to contribute to the building of her village well.
Money would help her have a deeper impact. Money was an enabler.
The old image she kept in her head, she confessed, was her rich self living alone and loveless in a big house. The new visual had her giving to causes dear to her. All because she had money.
Belief about murder
Any belief can be changed if you keep searching for the right evidence.
The right evidence? Yes.
Toward the end of the critically acclaimed black comedy Barry, Barry, a hitman and fugitive, is returning after eight years of hibernation for one last kill. During this hiatus, he has changed his feathers. He is now a devout Christian. He buys a gun for the hit, and as he’s driving to the target, we have him listening to Christian podcasts. The first one says that all sins are the same. There’s no real reason to rank sins. Except murder, of course. Murder is the absolute worst. The pronouncement doesn’t help Barry.
A little while after, we see Barry listening to another podcast by another preacher-podcaster. This one admits that some sins are not all that bad. They are, well, just human behavior. Even the sin of taking another human life is subject to interpretation. It depends on why you’re killing someone. Killing to protect future generations is okay but you can’t just kill anyone that crosses you. In fact, that’s murder and you’ll go to Hell.
Barry’s deeply Christian soul continues to look for a hatch that will let it escape the sin of murder. He continues to flip through podcasts until he comes to this one ex-military preacher who declares, very on brand, that if you pray about it and look for God’s signs, murder is okay. Bingo, says Barry, turns off the ignition, and pulls out his brand new gun from the glove compartment.
Whether it is about money or murder, old beliefs can be hard to get rid of. Yet, any belief can be changed with the right evidence. Only if you know how to separate what’s right from what’s not.
📢 Last week, I put out a call for 1:1 discovery sessions with me as a coach. Thank you to all of you who responded 🙏 Some of you I have already spoken with. I’m looking forward to the remaining conversations. I’m looking to finalize my coaching engagements for the rest of the year, so if any of you are curious about what coaching can help you with (or know a friend who is), write to me at satyajit@satyajitrout.com or book a time at https://calendly.com/satyajit-asq/discovery-sessions
One of the other consequences of having this warped view of money is that when some people acquire it they deny it....even to themselves. We have so many so called 'middleclass' people in India who call themselves that, perceive themselves that and even behave that way because somewhere deep down they have shame, fear or just plain resistance to thinking of themselves as rich.