Do You Really Need more money?
As a Psychoanalyst, I am constantly asked by patients how to eliminate money worries.
And here’s what I tell my patients…
There are three ways to have more money. The first is to love making money and make life your playground for how to enjoy that capacity. People in sales jobs and commission-based enterprises, for example, have found good playgrounds for that enjoyment, as have real-estate tycoons.
The second way to have more money is to put more away. This means enjoying a spending plan and the extreme pleasure of watching a nest-egg grow, along with all of the security and dreaming that comes with it.
And finally, you can have more money simply by wanting more, which is a form of suffering that can really motivate you if it doesn’t overly depress you.
Most people in the first and second categories don’t need much emotional help, because their motivational systems are positive. If you love making money or putting it away, that motivation can drive a lot of positive money-having.
But for people who need to feel deprived, poor, insufficient, or who long for more money, therapy can help if the feelings get too depressing because while negative feelings are equally if not more motivating than positive feelings, they can also run the danger of becoming too painful.
So here are some tips for how to manage the excellent condition of being unhappy with the amount of money you have, and wanting more.
Embrace the Longing For More Money Gratefully.
For many people, feeling poor or longing for more money makes them feel ungrateful. Then, voices start ringing in your head, like “you have a roof over your head, a car, food on the table. It is enough.”
Gratitude is a great antidote to getting too depressed over wanting to have more money and a good reminder that if you aren’t making more, it’s OK.
It is a good idea, however, to extend your gratitude for the longing for more. If you feel ashamed or guilty that you want more, don’t. It doesn’t make you ungrateful, it’s just the particular motivation you need if you want to have more, so embrace it.
Being perpetually at peace with things, happy and grateful, is not the way to embrace the totality of your life. Instead, it is better to embrace your lack of satisfaction, your desire for more, and your dissatisfaction with what is. This adds tension and conflict in your life, which is harder, but it will also give it depth.
Yes! You Can Eliminate Money Worries!
It’s hard to feel optimistic, particularly after a disappointment like a job loss or business failure. You may be having trouble racking your brain for how to bring in more income and feel discouraged. At this time, your feelings of wanting more will really deplete you, and make it hard for you to feel in balance.
Stay the course, and have faith that these feelings of wanting can serve you, and take you places. Don’t forsake yourself. Gather strength through proper sleep, processing the discouragement to get support, and embracing your dissatisfaction, knowing that your ambitions need another path and that you will keep searching for it when you have the strength again.
Be in the Moment
Many people mistake dissatisfaction as a form of whiny, ungrateful, ego-oriented desires. But this is only true if those desires take you to stories. Like, for example, that you are a failure, you’re worthless, you’re not good enough, you can’t get things done, you’re too greedy or worse.
The key to being in the “now” is to take your longings to have more, and your dissatisfaction with what you have, as simply that. Let the feelings float across your consciousness like thick clouds. Then, go back to figuring out how to have more money.
