Wealth, Health..........and so on!!

From my Facebook wall since 16th April 2015:

A very inspiring write-up on Wealth !! Credit and Compliments go to the original Author !!

No clue who compiled this, kudos to him/her who has spent ample wealth of time and resources to think it over. 

I got this from a close friend of mine, courtesy him, Balakrishnan Ramaswamy Iyer, I am sharing this.  Unless he himself compiled this, he would not know the source even, it could be yet another share, but meaningful one though !!

*********************************************************************

What is wealth? How do you define wealth? As Wikipedia mentions, “Wealth is the abundance of valuable resources or valuable material possessions. The modern concept of wealth is of significance in all areas of economics, and clearly so for growth economics and development economics yet the meaning of wealth is context-dependent.” Did you get what the catch is? Context-dependent is a very important key word in the above definition. What does context-dependent mean? It means that wealth is self-defined word. We might have a pre-set idea in our head of what wealth might be and we know the most common conception and notion of wealth is having lots of money and a big bank account.

Now, wealth is not only limited to having lots of money or out-of-this-world cars, because that is the most superficial definition and the most common too. Wealth could be anything you want it to be for you and a good example of wealth is knowledge. Let me tell you why knowledge, even though not perceived as wealth, is one of the deepest definitions of wealth. This is because a lot of things could be taken away from you, whether it is money, cars, houses, and so on. However, education and knowledge can never be taken away from you.

Knowledge is one of the ways in which you can create a difference in this world. Knowledge is something you learn and could have a great impact on you where it changes your point of view about something or transform you into a more open-minded person. It could even enlighten you and widen your thinking so that you are planning effectively for the days to come and not only the present. This is of course in addition to earning the skills and experience necessary for a certain career or lifestyle.

So, start thinking outside the box and look at wealth from a different angle other than just the money. An additional aspect of wealth is improving and going forward all the time. Thus, always think of ways you could increase your wealth as well as perhaps other types of wealth such as attitude, communication skills, etc.

Below are some of the revealing truths about wealth:

1. Wealth ≠ Happiness

If you think wealth is all about money, popularity, and having a nice mansion, then you could be wrong. Would you rather be happy or just have a lot of money? You might think everyone will answer with happiness. However, you might be surprised to know that people just want to be rich and have materialistic things to get what they want. This is because people believe, even though they might not admit it, that they will get the money or become popular and that will bring about happiness.

It might sound logical that with these resources at your fingertips you would be able to do many things you only dreamed of and thus make you happier. However, happiness needs to come from one and only one place, and that is from within. You need to adjust and adapt until you feel that internally you are satisfied with what you have achieved and your place in society.

We have seen a lot of people over the years, ones with a lot of the common known “wealth” and people without any or with little wealth, that take away their lives for one reason or another. What does that tell you? This could only confirm that happiness does come from the inside and it is something no one can hand you per say, but something you need to grab and find yourself.

2. Wealth Cannot Buy Family

Family is a big part of our being as social animals. Who can ever imagine living without people around and especially family? This is just a hard thing to imagine because it is something against human instincts and nature.

Ever been in a situation where you welcomed a newborn into your family? How does it feel? This feeling of excitement that rushes through your body and soul, even though you might not be the father or mother of the child, is just a one-of-a-kind feeling let alone if it is your son or daughter.

Moreover, we do not have the option of choosing between different candidates to be our parents and you cannot go to some market and pick out parents or children in return for wealth. Thus, sitting in on a Sunday with the family at home or gathering outside somewhere is something that is priceless.

Never let go of family because they share with you the most important and best moments of your life and no matter how wealthy you are you need your family next to you at every instant.

3. Health Makes Wealth

Being wealthy in the common conception, known as having a lot of money, could sure allow you to hire professionals in the area of physical fitness. However, could you buy your health or maybe order an endurance package that will increase your stamina in replace for some wealth?

Everyone wants to be lively, stay fit, and be able to do whatever activities they desire. Initially some thoughts might go through your head making you feel lazy and not wanting to work and exert effort. However, once you realize that this work will payoff bigtime and once you feel the success you will forget all the hard work, you might have second thoughts of signing up for this. Plus, if work was very easy and simple everything would have come easy to us and we would not have felt the special feeling of accomplishment.

Thus, instead of letting your emotions and mood get the best of you, make sure you create a void in your calendar for exercising or some other kind of activity. Once it is there in the calendar you tend to have to do it and this increases your ability and contribution to society. Health is one of those things that need to be maintained and taken good care of to enjoy life to the fullest. Now, wealth is not a factor in the equation of health, unless you are wealthy in terms of your drive and will power.

The other and old-fashioned way of achieving good health is putting in the effort, dedication, and consistency. Once you start thinking of how your health could end up if you do not exercise and stay healthy, you could end up putting it as a high priority if not the highest. We need to figure out a way to maintain exercising and insert it somewhere in our daily routines schedules. Try to be flexible and keep trying to move your timings and appointments around until you find a void in which you can insert a couple of hours of exercise, even if it is just running around the house a few laps.

This could be the start, and then once you maintain this you can move on to more hours of exercise. All of us know that staying healthy is a big part of being wealthy, known as success in our dictionaries.

4. Grow Wealthier With Time Allocation

Time management and prioritization could actually be one of the top ways to gain a lot of wealth. You might be like, “What are you talking about?” Well, it is true because implementing time management hand in hand with prioritization can lead to a lot of success and wealth, something you define.

Prioritizing is an important tool by which you put first things first. So in the case where you had to choose between hanging out with friends and spending some time with the family, depending on how important each activity is, you would choose between the two and  put one of them first on your list. I know this is an extremely hard situation and choice since both activities are dear to you but we are often put in such hard situations in life and our decision matters a lot.

Having a list and organizing your priorities based on your judgement will not only help with putting first things first, but will also allow you to finish all your tasks according to importance and be more organized when it comes to other things too. You could use any of many creative ways to prioritize your tasks, but one creative yet simple way of prioritizing your life day by day is to mark activities of top importance with the number “1”, followed with the less important activities with the number “2”, and the least important activities with a “3”.

5. Rich-Poor Attitude = Wealth

Have you ever thought that you could be labeled as “wealthy” because of your attitude and the way you deal with things? Attitude plays a very important role in a lot of areas of life. For instance, having a positive attitude towards work could only lead you in one direction, which is the direction of success, improvement, and promotions.

Now, there are different attitudes when it comes to dealing and communicating with other people. There are those people who could be poor in terms of money and materialistic wealth, yet they are rich. How you might ask. Well, those individuals are indeed poor financially or even middle class but focus on their inner self and other areas such as knowledge which makes them really wealthy too. Politeness, honesty, respect, and commitment are values these individuals abide by.

On the other hand, we have those individuals who are well-off financially that they are sometimes blinded of true wealth and just think that the only wealth is having a lot of money and feel invincible as a result not realizing that this money could go away before they know it. As a result, they would be so big-headed, overconfident and feel they are of the most superior race and that everyone else is beneath them. Which type would you rather be? One thing worthy to notice is that attitude always prevails over money, so if you are wealthy financially that does not mean people will respect you and want to be friends with you.

Values, principles, etiquette, and inner soul are things that are higher on the list compared to materialistic money. Furthermore, why not both financial wealth and personal wealth and then you will be both respected and be able to attain your goals and ambitions, something money cannot buy.

6. Money Is Not Wealth

Again, this is the most common misconception associated with wealth. Let us be honest by saying that whenever we mention that someone is wealthy, the first thing that pops in our minds is “Wow, so he has a lot of  money and probably amazing cars and a huge mansion.”

I am not saying it is wrong to have this conversation going on in our brains, because this is the norm and what the society perceives and so it is not weird that we would think the same too. However, how about if we thought about wealth differently and started associating it with other important, valuable traits? Let us say you meet a person that is just very helpful and whenever you need them, they are there excited to help you. Would this person not have a wealthy soul and personality? Of course he would, and some people see that this kind of wealth is even better than the money.

7. Wealth Depends On You

Wealth is something that no one could force you to think about or define in a certain way. It is not something you can draw out clearly. Moreover, if we were to draw wealth as a portrait, it would be an abstract portrait since it really depends on your perception of it. If you talk to anyone about wealth, they would have a certain idea or notion of what you are talking about, but you might have them surprised when you inform them that you are talking about wealth as in manners for instance. Furthermore, some people define wealth as having a caring family that hears out their concerns and spends time with them regularly and this is something money can never buy.

Some people go beyond just the materialistic face of wealth and think of wealth as something that is prolonged and something with strong roots rather than just money that could come and go so quickly. We need to learn that this common misconception we have in life about that money equaling wealth, especially in today’s materialistic world is incorrect.

Money does not always equal wealth and success but unfortunately we tend to measure our self-worth when we look at our annual income. If we look at an individual with a sports car, we say is wealthier than us; however true wealth is defined by the person themselves depending on their goals and values.

Make sure you are wealthy in your own way and do not get stuck in the superficial wealth spiral.