We don’t live in an ideal world. You need money to live a decent life. That said, it’s dangerous to want to live your life in such a way as to constantly optimize your financial existence.
Money Is Just One Parameter In The Happiness Equation
Have you ever had the impression that one of your important life choices has been parasitized by the lure of money? The education we receive from an early age pushes us to do the right thing not for the sake of doing the right thing, but for the sake of a reward or to avoid punishment. This type of upbringing leads us to have a self-interested relationship in all the choices we make. Naturally, in adulthood, we move towards choices that are constantly motivated by gain. It’s one thing to be aware of the material realities of life, it’s quite another to constantly base our decisions on extrinsic motivations (money, status, etc.) that don’t take into account what we love and our innermost being. In the long run, we end up worn out and can reach a dead end.
What You Earn Isn’t Always Clear
Money is the variable that is in some ways certain: I’m going to do this thing because it brings me so much money. The problem is that there are countless things I can earn that can’t be quantified monetarily in the various adventures of life. Here’s a list of things you can accumulate that aren’t as quantifiable as money: experience, life lessons, the friendship of people you meet, the honor of doing a worthy job, for example, the pleasure derived from the activity in question or the improvement in our character linked to overcoming difficulties. All this is far from being known in advance, so it’s an illusion to believe that our choices are optimized just because they’ve been made with a monetary knowledge of what’s at stake.
Think Every Day As If You Had 10 Million Euros In Your Bank Account
To progress, you have to put yourself in the shoes of the person you’re not yet, let alone in the shoes of the person you want to be. The purest expression of our human nature is through our freedom. Money gives us the freedom to do whatever we want – it’s not an end in itself, but a means to accomplish things that really matter to us. Now, as a daily mental exercise, imagine that you had enough money in your account so that you didn’t have to worry anymore. What would you do if you were financially free? Would you continue the work you’re doing now? Would you choose to do the same activities you do at weekends or in your spare time in general? If so, you’re on the right track. If not, it means you need to change direction in your life.
This Mental Exercise Will Help You Make Better Decisions
If you put yourself for a few minutes each day in the shoes of someone who no longer cares about money, you’ll gain valuable clarity for your choices. A free person is someone who no longer really has a self-interested relationship with the world, choosing to do things for what they are and not for what they bring. Putting yourself in the shoes of someone who is financially free allows you to raise your consciousness, gain perspective and see where you might be headed.
Tomorrow’s World Will Be Richer
You may not realize it, but the world is getting richer. Hourly productivity in developed countries has increased at least 28-fold on average over 135 years (from 1870 to 2005), driven by mechanization, process improvements, staff training, automation and, more recently, artificial intelligence. The human population has not increased in the same way across the globe, which means that the total wealth created per capita would be far greater today than it was 150 years ago if it were distributed among every inhabitant of the planet. This trend is accentuated and accelerated by the exponential prowess of technology. On average, people will improve their living conditions, even if wealth is still very unevenly distributed. Your concern shouldn’t really be money…
Tomorrow’s World Will Be More Destroyed
Nature is going up in smoke as I write, in every corner of the northern hemisphere. Productivity has increased in part due to the exploitation of natural resources. These resources are running out, and the world is going from bad to worse from an ecological point of view. There’s a clear correlation between wealth and carbon footprint: the richer you are, the more you tend to pollute, because you consume more than the average.
It’s Impossible To Pursue Purely Altruistic Goals
You can never ignore the finiteness of your being. You will necessarily be motivated by physiological and egocentric needs. That said, human progress is about embracing ever greater causes. When you stop thinking about money, you have a more autotelic* and altruistic relationship with the world. Tomorrow’s world will be one of contrasts: rich and damaged from an environmental point of view, your mission, if you accept it, will be to live happily, and the first sign that you’ve achieved this is that you’ll make your environment (what surrounds you, your loved ones, your friends and nature in the final analysis) happy.
* According to Wiktionary: Who undertakes an activity for no other purpose than the intense satisfaction it brings, referring to a person. Which is undertaken for no other purpose than itself, referring to an activity. Having no other purpose than oneself, when referring to an artistic object.
