Your belief about lack or scarcity, is the most important determinant of whether or not you will ever become wealthy. Your beliefs are more important than knowledge, abilities or status. To paraphrase Henry Ford, - If you think you can be wealthy or you think you can't - you are right.' Where the average man sees lack, the achiever sees opportunity.
Money, as an intellectual pursuit, falls in the realm of the much maligned social science - economics. Economics seeks to make sense of, arguably (after health and love), the most pervasive and important devotions of human intellect and effort - productive enterprise. For man, at his essence, is a creator. The discipline attempts to explain the world of markets and labor, productivity and exchange, abundance and lack. This notion of lack, and some foibles applying economic theory, may be the reasons economics has been labeled "the dismal science." People have experienced great pain, emotional and physical, due to market miscalculations. And, as seems to be common practice - the first order of business when something goes wrong is to find someone to blame - in our modern world economists are the usual suspects.
It's been said of economists, "If you laid all the economists in the world end to end - they would never reach a conclusion." "Economists are people who work with numbers but don't have the personality to be accountants." "An economist is someone who sees something work in practice and wonders if it would work in theory." And, "Give me a one-handed economist! Economists always say, "On the one hand; on the other."" The thrust of such criticism usually follows a market failure.
Economics looks to measure, qualify, quantify and explain the means and management of production and consumption. It attempts, through a methodical and systematic process to answer weighty questions related to human prosperity. Economists struggle to clearly define what happens in markets and why. Armed with the ammunition of learned economic theories policy makers, capitalists, and entrepreneurs all try to leverage market insights to achieve profitable results. Those attempting to leverage economic insights however, fail to factor in the one variable that really matters.
Economics has failed to quantify the power of beliefs. Theoretically people are rational, self-serving, interested in maximizing benefits and minimizing costs. Why then can't economists formulate a market equation that determines accurately the economic response to a given stimuli? Because they are not considering all the factors in play. The economist's view is incomplete.
Economics is art and science attempting to explain cause and effect. Economists see what happened, label it, then ascribe cause to the effect. What they misunderstand is: cause is not in the same dimension as effect. Expressed another way, economists seek to understand the world by drawing conclusions about cause only from effects - without really understanding cause. The main driver of cause is beliefs - beliefs about who you are, what you can do, and the circumstances of this world.
Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth of Nations of the "Invisible Hand" guiding markets, producing a collective benefit from the interaction of myriad self-interests. This "Invisible Hand" is in the realm of cause. The invisible hand is the force of belief.
Markets rise and fall, economies and societies are built, and individuals succeed or fail, as a result of human psychology. Our beliefs about abundance or scarcity, opportunity or limitations impel individual prospects which in turn empower collective progress. Economics seeks to make sense of a reality designed and moved by fundamental values and ideas about the world and society. The equation of supply and demand is less about capital, resources and systems than it is about relative condition of the human psyche.
If money makes the world go round, then it is beliefs about money, markets and exchange that fuels the engine moving the world. Don't make the economists' mistake, don't underestimate the influence of beliefs in markets or in life. What you believe creates your reality. If you believe in abundance you will prosper. If you subscribe to limitations boundaries will define your life.
The most powerful economic theory is the one that rouses people to believe this reality is limitless, resources are plentiful and opportunities abound. Believe you can be wealthy, cling tight to that belief, and you will be wealthy. For beliefs drive economics.
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