Greed: The Hidden Pothole on the Road to Abundance

• April 7, 2018

Abundance is both an evocative destination, and a powerful force. Like many of Mother Nature’s simple gifts, you might spend a lifetime trying to grasp it.

Actually, most of us are more familiar with its impoverished cousin, scarcity. It is also both a destination and a force, and is equally powerful … but entirely negative.

When I think back on many of the lowest points in my life, I realize that I had slipped into scarcity thinking—the prevailing belief that resource and reward are limited.

A scarcity mindset is dangerous for two reasons. First, it’s simply not fun. Endless competition for limited resources is both exhausting and depressing. Second, our thoughts are powerfully predictive—we invite into reality what occupies our minds. When we think scarcity, we get it!

The concept is easier to understand when we contemplate concrete resources and rewards such as money. But it is equally common, and far more destructive, when applied to more abstract assets, such as love and happiness.

We all long to live in abundance. One positive step is to think about resources and rewards as unlimited. Sounds simple, right?

But, there is a dangerous trap if this is all you do.

The problem with a scarcity mindset is not simply your focus on limitation. An equal danger is the accompanying emotion of fear. And when you shift from scarcity without shifting from fear, you adopt a mindset of greed—a particularly unattractive, and miserable state of being.

Greedy people may end up boasting great wealth, but the accumulation of assets seldom overcomes the damaging effect of fear.

So, to manifest abundance, we must contemplate unlimited resource and reward, without fear!

To many, the thought of unlimited resources may be strange, even unrealistic.

I invite you to think about energy. Some days, I come home to collapse on the couch, exhausted. As I feel my own energy depletion, I am tricked into thinking that it is a finite resource.

But, if I look around me, I quickly realize that the universe is flooded with seemingly unlimited energy. The atoms that make up our body are held together with energy. The wind and waves are constantly producing and consuming energy. The sun beams down energy to our world. And beyond earth’s atmosphere, the planets, moon and stars are all held together by the same energy.

We have yet to find the limits beyond which there is no energy. It makes my request for a tiny boost at the end of a long day seem almost trivial!

When we understand that energy is unlimited, we can begin to appreciate that our most cherished gifts such as love and happiness may also be unrestricted riches.

This is abundance!

Like scarcity thinking, abundance thinking is a powerful habit. Instead of inviting gloom and doom into our world, it invites light, joy and peace.

Your greatest gift is that you get to choose between the three mindsets. It’s in your hands!

What will you choose?

Have fun,

Roddy