Welcome back to The Self Love Fix. Today, I want to talk about why having money doesn’t make you selfish or greedy.

This conversation actually started in my free community Facebook group, the Shameless Societea. I asked everyone to chime in and write what their limiting beliefs around money were and what prevents them from having more, and quite a few people mentioned greed. They were afraid to appear greedy.

Some people even mentioned that they feel yucky having more money in their account. They feel the impulse to spend it, because they don’t like the idea of keeping it. Just the act of having money feels greedy.

I don’t believe having or wanting money makes you greedy. I don’t believe it makes you selfish. I actually believe that having more money benefits everybody around you.

Here’s why we’re having this conversation: because if you view money as something that is yucky or something that makes you greedy or something that makes you selfish, or you look at people who have money as greedy or selfish, you are going to unconsciously do everything you can to prevent yourself from having more money.

Sometimes, when people do have a windfall of money, this unconscious belief manifests as them spending it all incredibly quickly, and they don’t really even know where it went.

Unconsciously, if you feel it’s greedy or selfish to have more, then you’re going to find a way to make sure you don’t have any of it, because you don’t want to be seen as greedy or selfish.

So what do you need to do in order to finally receive the “more” you consciously say you want? Let’s dive into that.

Wanting More is Unselfish

Here’s why I believe that having and wanting more money is beneficial to everyone around you: something that I think about all the time is family. I don’t have my own family yet—I don’t have kids or anything like that, and I’m not married—but I’m thinking forward.

When I do have kids, I don’t want them to inherit fear around money the way I did. I don’t want them to inherit a frazzled nervous system around money.

So for me, wanting more money goes beyond me, because when I have kids, do I want the large majority of our conversations that they hear to be panic about money? Do I want them to hear, “You can’t have that. We don’t have the money for that,” and then they walk through the world with that mentality of restriction of limitation around money?

I don’t want that. I imagine a world where when I have kids, I get choices.

If I want to put them in private school, I want to be able to put them in private school. If I want to go on vacations to Disneyland or Six Flags, I want to be able to choose to eat in the parks instead of walking back to the car to eat packed lunches, like I used to do when I was a kid.

When it comes to college, if they choose to go to college, I don’t want my kid to be struggling. I was fortunate enough that my parents paid for my cost of living in college, but I saw many friends having to work constantly on top of going to school, and I don’t want my kids to have that.

I want them to learn things, of course, but I don’t want them to have to struggle.

So for me, wanting more money isn’t selfish. It isn’t about me. It’s about my future family.

Money Extends Your Influence

Another thing about having money that’s really cool to me is that money extends your influence and helps you with creating impact.

Now, influence can be positive or negative. We’ve all seen that. We’ve seen that there are people who have large amounts of money and do incredible things with that money, and we’ve also seen people creating impact negatively through money.

For example, if anybody knows Issa Rae, she started out doing Awkward Black Girl on YouTube with the resources she had. And then as things began to happen for her—HBO gave her a contract, she made more money, etcetera—she started extending her influence. She took a lot of what she had and she reinvested in other projects such as her own production company, and I believe she owns a coffee place in Compton.

She’s extending her influence. She gets to give back to her community. She’s creating a legacy where people who look like her—people who look like me—are visible in the media.

That’s not possible without money. It’s just not.

Money also extends your influence through creating impact. I wouldn’t be able to have a podcast if I didn’t pay for my podcast host every month. I remember there was a time when I first started out where I had to take this money out of my own account for everything. I was funding everything from my own accounts, using the money I made as a dietician. And I was feeling it, but I didn’t care, because I got to extend my influence and continue creating impact.

I have a message to share. I’ve got things to tell people. So thank God for money, because I can’t physically go into like people’s houses, right? The only way for people to hear this message is through my podcast.

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Money is a Mirror

It’s so crazy to me that people think money is this thing that makes you greedy or selfish, and it’s actually quite the opposite.

Here’s the deal: it depends on the person and their values. Money doesn’t do anything but reflect what somebody’s values are. It reflects who somebody is at their core. That’s all it does.

A lot of people cannot hold the duality of what money can be and what money can do. People make it out to be this bad thing. People project onto money and say it’s this bad evil tool, and it’s not. It’s neutral, right? It’s just a mirror. A mirror isn’t good or bad. It just reflects whatever you are back at yourself.

There are some people who do use money in ways that are not so ethical, and in those cases, money can seem to be a terrible weapon. And money can also be a tool that helps and supports people in incredible ways.

Less is More…Selfish, That Is

I actually believe it’s more selfish for me to be with less money.

I can’t keep creating impact with less money. I can’t. If I were in a position right now where I had $0 in my bank account, I’d have to shut down everything.

I wouldn’t be able to do podcasts. I wouldn’t be able to do emails. I wouldn’t be able to teach. I wouldn’t be able to coach. I’d have to shut down everything, and I would no longer be creating impact.

I actually believe it would be more selfish for me to not have money, because I’d be holding back my gifts. I’d be holding back my talents. I’d be holding back my influence. I’d be killing my ability to keep creating impact.

I believe every single person on this earth is here for creating influence and creating impact.

Creating impact does not necessarily mean being a business owner, being an entrepreneur, being a coach, being an influencer, whatever. You can work on creating impact in your community. You can create impact with your family. I know there’s a lot of people who have a desire to retire their parents. I know there’s a lot of people who have a desire to own a home.

That’s impact. That’s influence.

I believe every single person is here to create influence and impact, but we all think it has to be this big, big thing, and we don’t realize all the small ways we get to create impact.

So don’t limit yourself by placing this idea of greed and selfishness around having more money. You get to decide how you use it; you get to create impact that can positively influence your family for generations to come.

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