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money and finance

6 WAYS TO BE RICH EVERY DAY OF YOUR LIFE

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grasshopper on top of world

1. COMPILE YOUR BUCKET LIST NOW– NOT WHEN YOU ARE SERIOUSLY CONTEMPLATING YOUR OWN MORTALITY.  This is the best way there is to discern and get clarity on where your priorities really are and to what hidden parts of you have been denied all of these years. Then, start doing those things now. Guess what? You are now living the dream.

 

  1. REDEFINE “WEALTH” ACCORDING TO PRIORITIES FOUND IN # 1. For me, wealth is discretionary time and freedom. It’s the likelihood and ability to do the things I want to  now, not “when I retire in 40 years.” The truth is our friend, and the truth is that there are no guarantees. Do you really want your life to begin decades from now?

 

  1. REMOVE THE CLUTTER. It affects your attitude and potential. If I hang on to every purchase I’ve ever made, “ because I might need it someday” or “ I might lose everything”, it creates an attitude of scarcity and fear. I’m the worst about this. Every object has sentimental value, but I live in a small house, and if I don’t get rid of the things I haven’t used in a year, my precious living- space becomes an episode of Hoarders. There is another reason: Even though I tell myself I’m a disorganized artist, the clutter affects my mental clarity, discipline, and peace. I don’t want to have to double the size of my house every 10 years simply to store my “ things.” Think of all of the people living in huge warehouse- type houses, who are under water on their mortgages.

 

  1. LIVE A LIFE THAT ALLOWS FOR MORE OPPORTUNITY AND CHANGE. What if the opportunity of a lifetime presents itself today? Could you pick up and go follow it tomorrow?

 

  1. AS A COROLLARY TO NUMBERS 1-4, LIVE A LIFE THAT IS FREE. Debt- free, cage- free, worry- free, clutter free. It’s freakishly weird, but almost every adult in my extended family growing up was a banker.  They all said the same thing: “If  you don’t have the cash to buy it, don’t buy it.” Obviously, I am not suggesting going off the grid.   For anyone not Amish, that could present an obstacle or two.  But, it’s a matter of degree, isn’t it? One or two credit cards may be necessary, but 6-10, may be quicksand.

abundantfruit

  1. LOOSEN THE GRIP. I have my first dime, and my second and my third. I want to be ready for emergencies, so I tend to not spend, even if it might be critical for my long term well being. This stems from the delusion that if I am cautious nothing bad will happen. But, while I’m trying to control everything, I’m not discovering, learning, or living. It helps me to remember that my material possessions aren’t really mine. They come from the Source of Infinite Wealth to be funneled through me to go where they need to go, and eventually replenished. If God doesn’t call the equipped, but equips the called, I will have what I need when I need it, as I continue on my journey of discovery. My job is to stay limber, stay ready and await further instructions:)

 

THE PRODIGAL WRITER by L E Kinzie

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“I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all; but whatever I have placed in God’s hands, that I still possess.”

Martin Luther

 

In my twenties, I was a lawyer and proud of it. I was proud of being perceived as powerful and independent, but underneath that pride was a psyche composed of Jell-O and ruled by fear. I had no idea that at the root of most of what I did was greed. I had the first dime I ever made. I was saving for the future. How could that be greedy? I did not trust that there would always be enough and that it was not up to me alone to provide it.

Then, I got married, bought a house and had two kids in very short order. I began to have a mini midlife meltdown in my 30s that lasted for a decade. I had this feeling deep inside that I needed to run away and just escape, but I did not know how to extract myself from the Golden Handcuffs I had willingly put on. I was a horrible person, because everything I did was prompted by the fear of losing that paycheck. I was all bravado and no bravery, because I was trying to “ muscle through” a pervading fear of the future.

God was patiently waiting, while I ignored him and tried to rule and fix my world and myself. Eventually he answered my unspoken prayer for escape.

Someone finally did me the favor of firing me. I went into a tailspin and shook my fist at the heavens. How dare he free me by making me a failure! Who the heck did He want me to be?

Oprah had no answers. I threw myself into every new self- improvement trend that came along and grew progressively angry with God with every failed attempt to become Martha Stewart or Mother Theresa.

Having nowhere else to look, I looked within. I worked a 12 step program on myself and my need to control everything and begin to see that this fallow period was not about God stripping things away from me at all.

The only things he stripped away were my chains. He was actually returning the most precious things to me: the things of childhood. Trust. Hope. Willingness. Surrender. Dreams. Belief. Abandon. Living from the Heart. Knowing I am loved. Play. Play. Play.

 

Finally, I see God was never asking me to change myself, remove all my weaknesses or be strong. He was asking me to remember and return. He was asking me to remember the happy little 10-year-old girl who wrote poems to process her emotions and was closest to God and happiest when she did. I had completely eradicated her memory, but she was who I really was.

Words spewed out of me like a mal- functioning fountain and filled page after page. Eventually all of these words formed a non- fiction book about my long- overdue spiritual and artistic awakening. I started going to artists’ retreats. I started feeling…happy.

Like most writers, I have a non- writing job that pays the bills. Sometimes I get really tired of burning the candle at both ends. But, when that happens it’s because I’ve made a job out of my source of peace and joy, my means of connecting to God and sharing that connection with others. Life and writing become joyous again when I remember to give back to the original Creator all of my creations. Remember, return and repeat, as needed.