Many of us have heard the phrase, “money can’t buy happiness.” Now as much as having more money won’t result in you being happier, it can help you build a life that brings you joy. It’s all about shifting your money mindset from viewing money as the goal, to viewing money as a tool that can help you achieve your goals and live the life you want. In this article I am going to teach you how to get rich by seeing money as a tool and how this can help you reach what’s truly important. Here’s how to get started:
Understand Your Relationship with Money
The first step in how to get rich is changing your money mindset is to understand your current relationship with money. Take a moment to reflect on your beliefs and attitudes towards money. Do you believe that money is scarce and hard to come by? Or do you believe that there is an abundance of money in the world? Are you afraid of taking risks with your money or are you willing to invest in yourself and your future? By understanding your relationship with money, you can begin to identify any limiting beliefs or behaviors that may be holding you back. From there, you can start to reframe your mindset so it serves you.
Moving Away from Money as the End Game
So many of us, including myself, really want to get rich. I know I personally dream of having millions of dollars and never worrying about money. We set goals around how much money we want to make and have, but never stop to think of why. Why do you want more money? Take a second to think about this.
Money in and of itself, doesn’t bring you anything. But what money can do is allow you to afford more of what brings you joy. Now for you that may be the freedom money brings, the experiences it allows you to pursue, or the status that can come with having lots of money. Personally, I place a lot of value on freedom. So having more money means I’ll have the freedom to do and go wherever I want. So it’s not the money I’m after, it’s the freedom, and the money serves as a tool to get there.
Seeing Money as a Tool is Key in Learning How to Get Rich
Having more or less money has no direct impact on your quality of life. Instead, money can be used to generate more of what makes you happy. By shifting from seeing money as the goal to a means to get to your goal, you can be more intentional with using it to pursue what truly makes you happy.
Once your basic needs are taken care of (food, housing, security), I see money as serving two purposes. This is a concept adapted from Stephen Covey’s book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, in which he touts the importance of balancing both production (in the form of work that you’re outputting), and maintaining/enhancing your productive capability. Similarly, with any money left over, you should be balancing it between two purposes:
- Production – Using your money to pursue things and activities that bring you joy. To do this, you’ll need to look intrinsically and determine what brings you joy in your life. Again, as I value freedom, this may mean that I spend money outsourcing tasks I don’t want to do. This allows me to to buy back time so I can do what I want. For example, paying for a house cleaner to free up a couple hours to hang out with friends.
- Productive Capability – Using your money to invest in generating more money in the future. Traditionally we think first of investing in things like the stock market, but this could also mean investing in your own knowledge and capabilities.
Now how you allocate your excess money between those two purposes is up to your own values and stage of life, but it’s important that both are represented.
Broaden Your Definition of Investing
As mentioned above, one of the keys of how to get rich is investing in things that help you generate more money in the future. Now what I want to encourage you to do is broaden what you consider an investment. In the mainstream media, the stock market or real estate are often the first things that are mentioned, but investing in yourself can produce very high returns. Invest in your capabilities and knowledge. Invest in your skills to you can get to the next level in your business or career.
Once you shift away from seeing money as the end-game and start to see it as a tool, it helps you to loosen your grip. This makes things like paying for a course or a book much easier to do. Or investing in a software tool that will help you bring your business to the next level. Don’t be scared to let go of money in the short term, in exchange for exponential long term gains. In fact, business mogul and youtuber Alex Hormozi says especially at earlier stages in your career, your biggest focus with investment should be upskilling to increase your earning potential.
How To Get Rich in More Ways then One
Seeing money as a tool also allows you to expand your definition of rich. When you see money as the endgame, you think you get rich by having and making more money. But when you see money as a tool to get to your end goal, it allows you to build wealth in more aspects of your life. You can build a wealth of fitness, a wealth of experience, a wealth of relationship, and so much more. These are the things that will ultimately bring you the joy in your life.
Conclusion
Changing your beliefs around money is definitely not an easy thing to do, and it won’t happen overnight. But embracing change is key to progress and growth, and seeing money as a tool frees you up to use it for what truly brings you joy. It’s time to start seeing money as a positive force in your life and using it to achieve your goals. But don’t just read about it, get out there and take action. Take this information on how to get rich, and start investing in yourself and your future.