ASK THE COACH
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The Struggle to Succeed
By Dr. Ray Angelini
The Saratogian
October 21, 2003
Dear Dr. Ray,
I have been struggling for many years to succeed financially, but despite intense effort, I never seem to get there. What would you recommend?
— J.G. in Saratoga Springs
Dear J.G.,
The first thing to do is to clearly define what it means for you to be "financially successful."
In her landmark book, The Courage to Be Rich, Suze Orman discusses what is necessary to succeed financially.
In her first law of money she states, "People first, then money, then things." I believe it is impossible to be truly "rich" if we don't put our priorities in this order.
There are many examples in the news of individuals who are spectacularly wealthy financially, but are abject failures as human beings. The old saying that money can't buy love is absolutely true.
A life without love, regardless of how rich we are, is truly a poor life. In order to be truly rich, we have to not only put love first, but also guide our behavior based on a sound value system. We need to value doing what is right over what is expedient or profitable.
We also need to think of the effect our actions will have on ourselves and others, not only today, but tomorrow as well. Short-sightedness never leads to true and lasting wealth.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we have to truly get the concept that our net worth will never rise higher than our self-worth.
Sure, there are many examples of people who seem to "strike it rich" seemingly overnight, but how long does it last?
Invariably, people's sense of self-worth will be brought into balance with their net worth. That is, people who make a lot of money quickly will not hold onto it for long if they don't work on simultaneously increasing their self-worth.
In order to be truly rich, we must feel we deserve it and avoid the temptation to cast ourselves as victims.
We must stop settling for "just getting by" and make the most of what we have.
We cannot feel poor, victimized and undeserving and also expect to become wealthy. We must learn to feel wealthy and deserving, not greedy and entitled.
Increasing our self-worth opens us up to receive more, not only of money, but of love and other things as well.
As Suze Orman says so well, "Make yourself worthy of money and money will make itself worthy of you."
