Robert T. Kiyosaki is quoted as saying: “Money is only an idea. If you want more money, simply change your thinking.”

Who is Robert T. Kiyosaki?
From Wikipedia - Robert Toru Kiyosaki (born April 8, 1947) is an investor, businessman, self-help author and motivational speaker. Kiyosaki is best known for his Rich Dad, Poor Dad series of motivational books and other material. He has written 18 books which combined have sold over 26 million copies.

But what exactly does Kiyosaki mean by “if you want more money simply change your thinking”?

Since I was wrangling with that question myself I did some poking around and discovered that Kiyosaki was referring to the difference between the way the rich think about money and the way the poor think about money and how this translates to having more money for the rich and less money for the poor. He claims, “It’s what’s in your head that determines what’s in your hand.”

Nothing in your hands? It might be because you follow the thinking patterns of the poor. But how do you identify those thinking patterns that keep your pockets empty, your bank account balance at zero and you slaving every day for a small pay check that provides just enough money for you to put some extra cash in someone else’s pocket and increase someone else’s bank account balance?

I found this very interesting chart on the website doctorkhalsa.com. It is said to summarize some of the different ways that rich and middl-class parents think and communicate with their children around topics of money. You can access the accompanying article by clicking here

You might think to yourself, well I don’t have children so this doesn’t apply to me; but remember, you were a child once so you would now be an adult child of someone who communicated thoughts and demonstrated attitudes to you that are now playing out in your adult life. Your lack of money is a consequence of not having developed the right attitudes and cultivated the right habits and ideas about money in your childhood. You grew up poor, you’re still poor; and if you have children, they’ll probably also become poor adults because you’ve passed on the attitudes and ideas about money to them that were passed on to you. But as with all things controlled by thought, you can learn new habits and embrace new ideas in order to redirect the course of your financial life.

One way in which I would start would be to begin reprogramming myself not to think of money as just being something to be spent to obtain things I want whether or not I need them.

It isn’t what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about.

Dale Carnegie

This is so obvious and yet so many of us are still torturing ourselves every day because we don’t have what we want, we aren’t who we feel we ought to be, and we think that’s the reason we’re unhappy. In reality we’re unhappy because we’re thinking about the fact that we don’t have what we want and are not who we feel we ought to be. If we were thinking instead about something that amuses us we might be smiling or laughing. It is indeed what we’re thinking that controls what we’re feeling. If you want to feel good, think good thoughts. If you’re feeling bad it’s because you’re thinking about something that makes you feel that way so why not close the door on the depressing thoughts? Why not think about something that inspires you instead?

Thinking can be as much destructive as constructive, and practicing constructive thinking will be far more beneficial than cultivating and nurturing a habit for destructive thinking. Don’t sit around torturing yourself unnecessarily.

You can’t be afraid to take chances in life otherwise you’ll go only as far as your fear will take you; and since fear is not a positively rooted condition, fear cannot move you in a positive direction.

Fear can only cripple you and subject you to remaining where you are or send you running away from whatever it is you fear. And any time you are running away from something, you’re not facing it which means it has power over you even while you’re cringing in your protective shell avoiding a confrontation with it.

From Franklin Delanor Roosevelt’s inaugural speech - So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.

Are you so afraid of failing that you refuse to take a chance and go after your dreams just so you can avoid possible ridicule? What if success is what awaits you rather than failure? Is your fear of failure stronger than your desire to fulfill your dream? Will you refuse to take a chance on yourself just because you don’t want to deal with the possibility that things might not work out the way you want them to? You might fail even after you’ve put in 100% effort, that’s always a possibility; but you might also succeed. However on the opposite of that is the reality that if you never try in the first place you’ll never know the outcome. At least if you try and fail you can give yourself full credit for taking the chance instead of allowing fear to cripple you.