Money is the blood of the world we currently live in. If it stops flowing, the whole economy and the world will stop.
Money plays a vital role in everyone’s life, and no matter how much you hate it, you need it in order to live life gracefully.
Despite so much importance of money in our lives, most people seem to struggle with it. It is evident by the facts that 59% of Americans admit to living paycheck to paycheck. And 66% of millennials think they’re off track when it comes to money and savings.
The current situation raises the question- do we really know everything about money? Or are we still unaware of the truth about money? Is our current understanding of money correct?
Do we know what’s the real reason that some people are so rich while others are poor? For example, why is the Jewish community disproportionately rich in almost all countries?
Do they cheat their way up? Are they just lucky? Did they learn how to make money because of natural selection?
Most importantly, what can you learn from Jewish money principles to become wealthy and reach your real money potential?
Today, Rabbi Daniel Lapin, author of Thou Shall Prosper, will help you understand the truth about money and the secrets behind the financial success of the Jew community.
Jewish Financial Principles
According to a study conducted by sociologist Lisa A. Keister, it was found that adherents of Judaism have accumulated the most wealth in the United States.
It is not only the case with the United States right now, but true for almost all countries where Jews reside and have been true throughout history.
Are there poor Jews? Of course. But looking in terms of numbers and population, they are more financially affluent than any other group.
The question in your mind would be, why is that? Well, Rabbi Daniel’s answer to that is because of the different belief systems.
In his own words, “why is it that amateur athletes today run the four-minute mile routinely, but until May 1953, nobody had done it until the very first person to run a four-minute mile was Roger Bannister? It is because now, people believe that it can be done.”
The bottom line is that nobody can succeed at any activity that deep inside one’s heart feels to be morally reprehensible.
If you are a decent human being and you believe that making money is basically taking money from other people, which, by the way, is a very deeply implanted and widespread belief, then you will never be good at money.
Putting it simply, if making money is uncomfortable for you, then you can never make it. Nobody can succeed at something that embarrasses them internally.
Rabbi Daniel describes the thinking that taking money from others for your services somehow hurts them as a tragic and diseased way of thinking.
Change Your Thinking About Money
A better way of thinking, which the Jewish community intuitively follows and is probably one of the reasons behind their financial success, is thinking in terms of how you can serve people better instead of thinking about how can you get more money from them.
It is no accident that the same word is used in ancient Jew scriptures for worshiping God and taking care of the needs of other people, says Daniel.
In other words, Jews have a deep conviction that by taking care of God’s other children, they’re are making God happy.
Since serving to other people is almost equivalent to serving God, and business is all about serving other people. Jews tend to do well in business.
What you can learn from this is the fact that business is all about serving others. Because whatever you’re doing, you’re serving a customer, a client, or an employer. There is somebody who is benefitting from what you are doing.
So if you want to make money or grow your business, all you need to do is serve better and serve more people. Money is the byproduct of better service.
Also Read: How to Change Your Life in 2021
The Truth About Money
Money is something you think you have conscious control over, but do you really? It is a question to meditate around. Because most of the time, if you’re struggling with money, then you can’t say you’ve control over it. In fact, it has control over you.
According to Rabbi Daniel, money is something you don’t have conscious control over. But you do have subconscious control over it. And there are ways to engineer your subconscious mind discussed in his book Thou Shall Prosper.
Most people have the wrong understanding or blurred image of money in their subconscious minds. Mainly fed to them by mainstream media and Hollywood.
When this blurred image causes people to struggle financially, you see them complaining about the system or society being rigged, like “I’m not paid enough,” “I work much harder than these millionaires, yet I’m not rich.”
Here’s the truth: Money is not paid to you in proportion to how hard you work or how much you work. It’s paid in terms of the impact or value your work creates.
This simple truth will help you realize why some people get more money for an Instagram post than your whole year’s salary working 40 hours a week. It is because their Instagram post creates a larger impact.
Jeff Bezos is not getting paid for working 12 hours a day when he started Amazon. Or whatever amount he is working right now. He is getting paid in billions because Amazon creates a huge amount of value by solving the problems of millions of shoppers.
You might have seen a lot of people complaining about being underpaid. Rabbi Daniel tells the story of a middle school teacher who, when talking to Daniel on his show, complained about being underpaid.
Daniel jumped on that and asked her to quit immediately from this exploitative employer who is paying her less than her worth and go where she will be paid more.
She said, “there’s nowhere I can be paid more.” It is because she is getting paid exactly in proportion to the amount of value her work creates, and not how many hours she worked.
Make Money
To conclude things, here are some quotable words by Rabbi Daniel Lapin: Making money is a dignified, moral, and upright occupation.
So make money as much as you can. Obviously, not by stealing it from others or by any unfair means. But by providing the best service you can to the people who need it.
The goal and the aspiration to make more money is really another way of saying having the goals and the aspirations of pleasing other human beings doing your best to improve their lives.
Remember, you’re not hurting anybody by charging money for your services. It is a normal economic transaction between a consumer and a provider.
The better service you provide, or the bigger problem you solve, the more money you can charge from others. It is your right and their obligation.
Once again, it is not the hard work or more work that brings you more money. It is the impact and value your work provides that decides how much you’ll be making.
Create value and impact with your work by changing people’s lives for the better. And money will start flowing almost automatically.
