Money Myths: The Rich Stole Their Riches

This article is part of the money myths series. In each article, we explore one money myth and how this money myth may be keeping you from more money. For this particular post, we discusses the money myth that the rich stole their riches. Here are the other articles in the series:

It’s not hard to see why many people think the rich stole their riches. After all, we often hear about how some unsavory, lying, Wall Street investor bilked billions from seniors. This money is often their life’s savings. These guys are now enjoying the high life.

But is it really true? Do the rich really attain their wealth illegally?

To dis-spell this myth, it helps to first examine the source of our information. For most people, it’s the News. The News tend to make things far worse than they actually are by blowing things way out of proportion. Worse yet, they provide a completely one-sided view of the world. This in turn creates a huge amount of bias in viewers.

The Only News Is Bad News

I’m not a fan of the News in any form. All news is fake news for a simple reason. The majority of news aren’t based on facts any more. They are often based on someone else’s opinions or personal agenda.

Even news which seem objective still contains bias. If you examine the language carefully, you will notice bias. You can tell by the connotation of the words and how they are used.

For example, you can tell a journalist’s immediate dislike for certain presidents by the use of the phrase “Mr. X” rather than “President X”. If they cannot be objective here, then how can you expect them to report on events in an objective manner?

The term availability heuristics is our human tendency to think of immediate examples when evaluating subjects. For example, the news starts reporting on food poisoning for a month. Soon, we believe that food poisoning is on the rise because all we can think of are the recent stories on food poisoning, even if data point to the contrary!

Remember that the news will only report on stories they think will create viewership and high ratings. They are no different than when your favorite TV series shows ads in that they need money in order to survive.

When you hear about the Bernie Madoffs of the world, you hear about it to the point of over-saturation. While he did do wrong, this is an example of how the media manipulates and programs you. At some level, the journalist starts equating money with thievery. After all, who writes these articles and reports on this type of news? It’s likely someone who holds the same money beliefs as you do!

With this bit of background information, let’s discover the real truth about the rich stealing their riches.

If Money Is Just an Indicator of Success Then How Could the Rich Have Stolen Their Riches?

What if I told you the rich got rich by providing great value to other people? In return for that value, they are monetarily compensated. Money is an indicator of success. The more successful you are, the more money you tend to have.

It may be hard for you to jump from the belief that “the rich stole their riches” to “the rich provide great value to other people.” So, let’s take a look at billionaires philanthropists like Bill Gates. Gates has given quite a bit back to the world. Good people often have altruistic desires. Money amplifies that goodness.

You might be thinking, “Big deal! If I had a billion dollars, I wouldn’t have any issues with giving away several million every year either.”

But is that really true? I used to think people who make a lot of money really shouldn’t be giving advice to people who made significantly less. I knew a guy who benefited greatly from the Silicon Valley dot com boom. His net worth was in the tens of millions. So, when he gave me some advice to stop being so cheap and just buy a new car, I blew up in his face.

“How dare you give me advice when you make so much more than me! You don’t know what it’s like to not have enough money.” That was essentially my tone even though my words were something else.

If You Think You Have a $45,000 Problem Now…

Just Wait Until You Have a $100,000 Problem

I would come to realize just how ignorant I was being. Whether you make $50,000, $125,000, or $200,000, you will always worry about money. It’s just a fact of life. If you didn’t worry about money, then you likely do not have a lot of money. Money is just energy and how we manage that energy translates to other areas of our lives. If you’re tight with money, you’re likely not managing other parts of your life well.

As another example, I’ve had the same computer for the past 6 years. It has gotten increasingly slow, to the point that it takes tens of minutes to do something simple, like check email. Basically, I was managing my energy poorly. In all that time, I could have easily purchased a new computer and saved time. Imagine how much time I would have saved in the course of a month, especially when I do the same things every day on this old computer!

What I would come to realize was while I was a miser of time, guarding it jealously when other people tried to monopolize it, I wasn’t a good steward on how I used time.

It took me a long time to figure this out. I hope you will avoid the same mistakes, too.

Stop Believing the Rich Stole Their Riches

Money Serves the Greater Good

Money should always be serving you. The purpose of money is simple. It enables us to live comfortably. It extends the good we can do in the world. Finally, it amplifies the time in which we can do this good.

So, if you’re naturally a good person then money will amplify your good. If you have dreams of providing education to people in less fortunate parts of the world, that money enables you to amplify your dreams of providing that education. Certainly, it will take you much longer to go to that part of the world so as to build a school with your own two hands and put together the infrastructure of not just supplies but personnel. Money enables all these things to happen in a shorter period of time.

Believing the rich stole their money is another form of resistance. You resist because you think the only way to come into money is by stealing it. You resist because every time you come into money, you think you had to do something illegal to get it in the first place. Thinking like this causes you to subconsciously push money away.

Surround Yourself With the Right People

Want to know the best way to destroy this false money belief that the rich stole their riches? Become friends with billionaires! Of course, this is a bit tongue-in-cheek. Actually, you may already have rich friends without knowing it. If you know business owners who are highly successful, then start hanging out with them to see how they think. Likewise, if you have friends with high net worths, chat with them to see what their thinking process is like.

If you have neither of these, then make virtual friends. Study the works of financial gurus and businessowners you respect. Listen to their Podcasts. In short, get into their minds and think like they think. One of my favorite prosperity coaches is Bob Proctor.

You’d likely find their thinking processes to be quite different than yours. Most money-minded people tend to look for ways to create more streams of income, either through businesses, real estate, or stocks. They want to discover new ways of putting their money to work, making more money.

The poor in mind…they just want to watch TV, play video games, and otherwise engage in unproductive activities.

The prosperous (rich) will read books on financing and continually challenge their own beliefs.

The poor in mind…they will believe they are always right, stuck in their own ways.

The contrast in how the rich and the poor think are as different as night and day. If you want to have more prosperity in your life, then start thinking like a prosperous person would.

You can see now why this belief that the rich stole their riches is false. The rich simply spends more time thinking about their finances through constant study and implementation. They learned how to create more assets, which brings more prosperity into their lives.

Money Freedom Guy