Your Recovery From a Good Upbringing

by Phil Laut
Author of Money Is My Friend
and Wealth without a Job

One of the most valuable insights that comes with experience is that so called "conventional wisdom" is far more conventional than it is wise. I believe this is especially true when it comes to conventional wisdom about money. Some of you have already discovered that the conventional wisdom about wealth generation:

• Get a good education
• Get a job with a good company and work your way up
• Work hard

Based of several decades of experience in teaching thousands of people to earn the income they want from work they love, I have learned that the most significant factor in increasing income is getting free of parental conditioning. Here I am referring to the unintentional conditioning that results from 20,000 meals with people who had the wrong information about money.

Your parents didn't give you useful information about money. It's no one's fault. That bears repeating. It's no one's fault. Keep in mind the most important aspect of the past is not what actually happened but how it affects you today. True, you can't have a better past--despite those people who use "If only" thinking in a vain effort to improve their past. You can choose how your past affects you. Money comes from other people, so your ability to get more of it depends a great deal how well you discuss money with others.

Take a moment to recall your parents' discussions about money. If you are like most people, their discussions were non-existent, negative or very negative. If your parents avoided discussion of money issues, it is most likely you concluded money is something impolite to discuss or mysterious.

In many families the discussions about money are negative only and deal with shortage, limitation and complaints about the items that cannot be afforded. In extreme cases, the discussions about money are so negative as to be loud arguments. If your parents argued about money, this is likely to cause adult financial problems for you, at least until you resolve this issue and the associated uncomfortable feelings.

You may have concluded money causes arguments. Therefore the way to have peace is to have as little money as possible. The person with such a childhood experience would avoid discussions about money altogether. Whatever your parents taught you about money, it is has been so deeply ingrained during your 20,000 meals with them that the information may inhabit your consciousness as unnoticed, unquestioned truth.

Let's be specific about this wrong information. Generally, this wrong information takes the form of two particular ideas.

Dependency and consumerism.
From our upbringing we got the idea we are dependent. We are dependent--this means we can't take care of ourselves and therefore we should find a person or job who is dependable to take care of us .

This dependency starts with the viscerally experienced but never spoken message that all goodies come from one place. That place is Mommy. As adults this same message leads people to seek jobs as a way to recreate the infantile experience of all goodies coming from one place. Unfortunately, a job only provides an illusion of security (those of you who have been downsized know this firsthand). With a job, you receive an illusion of security in exchange for a lid on your income. Many people who start their own business experience some anxiety about relying on so many people, for income --(even though spreading the risk obviously increases safety).

The second of these belief systems from parents is consumerism. Consumerism involves the belief that the most important activity related to money is consumption rather than production. This idea of consumerism came from hearing parents complain about what they could not afford and from many experiences observing them in consumption mode. (my guess is you went shopping many more times with your parents than you visited their workplace). This emphasis on consumerism may lead to all kinds of problems with credit cards as adults. For example, in my household as a child, I don't remember EVER hearing the word "income" unless it was followed by the word "tax".

It is very likely you don't remember your parents telling you that you can't take care of yourself or It is very likely you don't remember your parents telling you that you should be a consumer. This is because they didn't TELL you these things. Instead they did something much more powerful than just TELLING you; they demonstrated these ideas by example. They acted them out in three dimensions every day for you to see over and over and over.

Successful people know that money has many more uses than consumerism and use it to advance their own internally designed purpose, free from the opinions and concerns of others.

Despite the fact that these beliefs from our parents don't serve us, we still have loyalty to them.
This means that when you want to start and succeed in your own business you are becoming a traitor. A traitor to your parental conditioning and the people who gave it to you.

Getting free of your parental conditioning will actually reduce the stress in your relationship with your parents.

I know otherwise confident and accomplished adults who tell me they feel like a ten year old around their parents. These are people not yet free of their parental conditioning. They are still doing things that make themselves angry in order to keep the peace. Let me say that again--they are still doing things that make themselves angry in order to keep the peace. What kind of peace is that? Certainly not peace within! Stop doing THAT immediately. Here are some suggestions to move your relationship with your parents to an adult level.

Relating to Your Parents as an Adult
1. Relate to them separately.
2. Ask them to retire
3. Stop trying to change them or get their approval

1. Relate to them separately.
Obviously your parents knew each other before you got here, except in the case of some step-parents. Possibly they support each other in maintaining denial and suppression around the topics they prefer to avoid. Additionally you may have more fun with them individually, if you haven't done this before. You may even be delightfully surprised getting to know them this way. Additionally, you now have some control over the degree of intimacy in your relationship with each of them. There is no right answer about how your relationship with them should be now that you are grown up, although the expectations on this topic may be huge. You can choose the place in the spectrum that suits you --anywhere from formal civility to warm-hearted affection.

2. Ask them to retire
By the time you're eighteen, your parents' work is pretty much complete. However, since no one comes along to tell them this, you may have to do it yourself. Point out they will remain your parents forever, worthy of the love and respect accorded their position. They only difference is they no longer need to do the work. They have become Mom Emeritus and Dad Emeritus. Remember, they have thought of themselves as your parents for a very long time, responsible for guiding and supporting you. We all enjoy feeling useful. Thus, you may need to discuss their retirement with them more than once before they agree. Should they persist in offering unsolicited advice and criticism, you can gently threaten them with Parents Anonymous--smile when you do this.

3. Stop trying to change them or get their approval
I remember telling my late mother, "Look, Mom, I am grown up now, so there isn't much you can do to change me at this point. So, please retire, so we have a more friendly relationship as adults." This works both ways. Of course, your parents should be different. But you'll be happier and wealthier, too, when you cease trying to change them, especially if you are trying to get their approval. It is quite likely their disapproval is a habitual attempt to control you. Now that you are grown up, you decide whether to grant them that control.

Regardless of the particular information we absorbed about money as children, it was most likely distorted by the fact that we learned much more about spending from our parents than about earning. Most of the time children observe their parents spending but do not accompany them to work where the earning occurs. This gives an erroneous emphasis to spending. Earning is far more important than spending.

As a shorthand and effective way of referring to the conditioning our parents gave us I use the phrase "inherited purpose." Inherited purpose is a good way to describe parental conditioning because the conditioning is much, much more than mere ideas. If you were to memorize Hamlet's "to Be or Not To Be" speech or the successive names of the first 40 Presidents of the US, you have done nothing more than fill you mind with information that has no effect on your behavior.

Tired of the results of following the conventional wisdom discussed here? Want to learn the unconventional secrets to changing your thinking and behavior to get free of the unconsciously acquired conditioning that trumps your efforts to move ahead?

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Copyright © 2007 Phil Laut. All rights reserved.