Episode 1115: The Paradox of Money

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1,115 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:07] Al Comeaux: I'm Al comeaux. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, talent, and treasures to live out your car. Having the ability to manage change is key. And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott Maderer.

[00:00:32] Scott Maderer: but it's about having the mindset and focusing on the right thing so that you're not worried about the fact that I'm not making enough money, that doesn't become the focus of attention, but instead it's okay. I can only do this much now. What can I do to position myself to get more of that? And you may discover that yes, you need to make more money to do that, but you also may discover that there's other [00:01:00] ways to do it.

[00:01:01] Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship pod. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling and the inspired stewardship podcast who will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:27] And today's episode about impacting the world through stewarding your treasures. I talk with you about how money and success. Aren't always what we think. I share why chasing money? Won't get you what you really want. And I also talk about why understanding what money does and does not do for us, helps us get what we really want as we talk about stewarding your treasures.

[00:01:50] Wouldn't it be great. If you could support this podcast and do it without costing yourself an extra dime. It turns out you can. All you have to [00:02:00] do is use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission, we'll come back to support the show. If you enjoy the show, when you're ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon.

[00:02:18] We often think that happiness is one of those things. That's going to come. When we finally get. Whatever it is that we want. And I've heard people a lot of times talk about money in this way. This idea of I'll be happy when I make $60,000 a year. I'll be happy when I make a hundred thousand dollars a year.

[00:02:38] I'll be happy whenever I've paid off. All of my debts. I'll be happy when my house is paid for. I'll be happy when I have a million dollars in retirement, I'll be happy when, and there's always a new way. And by the way, all of these things can happen for one person. And you hear discussions all the time about is [00:03:00] happiness.

[00:03:00] One of those things that you're either born an optimist or born a pessimist, are you someone that is always happy and optimistic or are you always pessimistic and sad and in a bad mood? And is this something that you're born that way or that you can change over time? We all know of characters and people who have what, at least for the world everyone would look at and say they are completely successful.

[00:03:27] They haven't all, and yet the more they seem to get the less happy they seem to be. And this seems to be a common phenomenon. It seems to be something that we all know of. And yet we all end up pursuing the same sort of thing where we look at their success and say, yeah, but if I had that, I'd be happy.

[00:03:50] And yet when we get something closer to that, we discover that we're not actually. See success is something that [00:04:00] somewhat has a paradoxical effect, whatever you're defining as success, when you get it, it turns out that relatively quickly, you get used to it. And then you discover that it does, it actually bring you as much happiness or at least not long lasting happiness as you thought.

[00:04:19] And so you set a new goal and you aim for a new target and you begin to work towards. And yet when you get that result as well, the same thing happens all over again. And we'll do this over and over. So if that's all true, if getting more money, if getting more success, if getting more of these things, is it what creates happiness for us?

[00:04:42] What should we do instead? And the answer is usually it depends because there really isn't a one size fits all answer, but you do need to recognize. That it's about finding those things that gets you more happiness and [00:05:00] then finding the things that help get you more of that. And those things are going to be different for different people.

[00:05:07] It turns out that when you look at things like your spiritual, your physical, your health your mind, relationships, emotions, these sort of fundamental kinds of characteristics. If you aim to improve those things, then it turns out that getting more money might actually allow you to spend more time on those fundamental areas.

[00:05:32] Developing, having more time to work out and develop your physical life or having more time to spend in relaxation and finding ways to develop your spiritual life or having more time to go back to school or to find other ways to study and develop your mind, or spend more time with family or relationship.

[00:05:52] It turns out that the money. And the success are tools that can be used to get [00:06:00] you more of the things that actually make you happy. The money itself is not the pursuit. It's why for one person, they may reach that happiness level at a different level of income and energy than someone else. And that's okay.

[00:06:19] It isn't bad. It just means that we need to develop our own understanding of what is the purpose of money? What is it that money does? It's a tool. And if it's a tool, then we need to use that tool. We need to understand how to use it, to get what we actually do want. And that means we would not spend money in areas that are wasting that money or spending that money in an area that's not in alignment with what.

[00:06:47] You have to understand your financial purpose so that you can run your financial decision-making through that filter. And it makes it easier both to say no. And to say yes to many [00:07:00] things. The strange paradox is if you pursue money as a way towards happiness, you won't be. But if you pursue money as a way to then spend more time and energy and go deeper in the areas that actually make you happy, longer term, you will get happier.

[00:07:20] You'll have fewer regrets, you'll waste less resources. You'll waste less emotional energy. You'll waste less time because you can actually spend the money that you do have in a way that you don't feel guilty. Again, it's back to what we talked about yesterday, that both a and a mindset recognizing that there's always going to be an opportunity cost with money, no matter what, if I do one thing with this money, I can't do something else.

[00:07:47] So what I want to do is make sure that what I'm doing with the money, I do have maximizes my move in those directions that actually connect emotionally with me, not [00:08:00] with anyone else with. How do you develop the life that you want? And it turns out that you can start doing that even if you're not making enough money.

[00:08:13] If you're not doing well enough yet if you're struggling with debt or maybe you're in a lower income job, but it's about having the mindset and focusing on the right thing so that you're not worried about the fact that quote, I'm not making enough money, that doesn't become the focus of attention, but instead it's okay.

[00:08:32] I can only do this much now. What can I do to position myself to get more of that? And you may discover that, yes, you need to make more money to do that, but you also may discover that there's other ways to do it. There was a couple that I was coaching that really wanted to travel when they retired and they were really worried about paying off their house so that they could get to a point where they could track.

[00:08:59] They [00:09:00] were older and were already coming up on retirement age, but they weren't quite there yet. And as we talked it through, we realized that travel was really what there was important to them. And it turned out that for them, it was better to sell their house today, even though they hadn't paid it off and done everything exactly the way that many of the gurus would tell them to do it, but to sell their house today, buy an RV, travel around the country.

[00:09:29] And then come back and settle in a much smaller house that they purchased for cash. At the end of that time, they managed to get the happiness and the travel without waiting and sacrificing, but they had to recognize that it was okay for them to do things a little different than others we're doing it because they focused on their real core reasons.

[00:09:55] And that's what you have to do as well. Thanks for listening.[00:10:00]

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