Wealthology

by Akinaw Bulcha

  “Most people work just hard enough not to get fired and get paid just enough money not to quit.” ~George Carlin.

  Conclusion

  The only question I haven‘t yet answered is how to distribute your product or service once you‘ve made it—perhaps I‘ll write on that some day. In my next letter, we‘ll discuss the second and more important part of productivity that we‘ve only hinted at in this one.

  Your Loving Uncle, Akinaw.

  Part V

  Making Things: The Secret Ingredient of Wealth Consciousness

  The Story Behind the Money Story

  Dear Kidus,

  If you were to ask me what the greatest benefit of coming to America was, I‘d say it‘s been learning how to break dance. No, I‘m kidding. Really, the greatest benefit has been the opportunity to expand my consciousness; exploring and learning as much as I can about what I see and what I don‘t see. When it comes to the principle of productivity, there‘s the part we do see but there‘s also a part we don‘t see.

  During my intellectual journey, I came to learn that the things that matter most to us, the things that shape our lives are things we don‘t see with our physical eyes (nor want to acknowledge with our hearts). We like to pretend that what we see is what we get. We think we live on the first floor of existence but it‘s all a façade, the real script is being created in the basement. One of the greatest discoveries of the 20th century was the existence of a separate, unconscious world within each of us that animates, controls, and chooses our actions much like a puppeteer does with his strings.

  This is how things are made—below the surface. The letter you hold in your hand, your home, your shoes and everything else humankind has made are the remnants of an unseen force that‘s created things through people.

  Because what happens in the basement is the real story (the unconscious) and not the party upstairs (our conscious life), any attempt at understanding a given topic (such as wealth creation), must try to find out what‘s going on downstairs.

  If we can find out what‘s happening below the surface, we will know what things we need to change to create more wealth in our conscious experience. We can work with the unseen forces that make things. We should not leave the deepest parts of who we are on auto drive. We can master it. In all my letters, you‘ll notice I‘ve been realistically optimistic (despite talking about difficult topics); nothing has changed when looking at the main Actor in economic activity—you. My optimism is based on the psychological finding that our lives are much like movies. All we must do to have the movie end the way we want is to break into the projection room and change the film reels. Once the reels have been changed, the movie (our lives) will also change.

  “Success comes to those who become success conscious. Failure comes to those who allow themselves to become failure conscious.” ~Napoleon Hill.

  What is the Causeof Productivity? So what is the true cause of productivity? What makes someone do the things millionaires do? What makes another do the things billionaires do? What makes others do the things thousandaires do?

  We only have one answer: ―As a man thinketh, so is he.‖ Ideas are not only the lifeblood of the economy, they are also the lifeblood of life. It‘s the eternal spring from which all human motivation comes from. Every religion and all the success literature of the 20th Century have said one thing: Like a reflection in water, your life is the physical manifestation of your inner state.

  Because you cannot have anything that you do not first have within, it would perhaps be wise to understand our soul"s economy.

  Success philosophy teaches much more than the fact that internal habits lead to wealth creation. True spiritual teaching also shows us how to unlock a seemingly inexhaustible source of inner power.

  “A man is literally what he thinks.” ~James Allen.

  The 64 Million Dollar Question The big question is this: How are inner, unseen, predispositions formed? How can we be the type of person that makes things? How do I make myself the type of person that practices the four principles of wealth creation?

  If we can answer that question, we can create our internal reality to produce what we want in our external world. Can we voluntarily choose a new mind and a new heart? Absolutely!

  We change our inner person by internalizing thoughts. Whether we believe prosperous ideas or impoverishing ones, our external world constantly reflects back to us the ideas that are anchored in our hearts.

  Christian theology teaches the importance of the internalization of spiritual thoughts. It states that, although a person may know God intellectually, that knowledge is not enough to change a person‘s will. What‘s needed is a new heart, to be born again in spirit, so that what‘s intellectually known can receive a kind of energy to effect real change. If the inner person hasn‘t changed, no amount of prodding, counseling, encouragement or other types of external stimuli can change his or her external choices. Being productive, therefore, isn‘t about external choices or stimuli. The same thing applies to making money—no amount of networking, cold calls, meetings will get you to produce more if somehow, internally you are fighting against the outcome you profess to want.

  External reality is merely a canvas, the artist resides inside. The colors you choose, the inspiration for the piece, the brush to be used are all decided on before the external work process even begins.

  In this way, you are, as an actor in the economy, working with the world of experience by taking things apart and putting them together to form it into a masterpiece others will find valuable. The world of experience is inert, static and lifeless; it sits waiting for you to do something to it. You can alter it one way or another to suit your purposes. What we see, hear and experience are inconsequential. What matters is your predisposition to the world of experience, to the world of ―perceived‖ facts.

  The promise of wealth consciousness is this: If you can purposefully create a brilliant inner artist, you can create masterpieces at will. How you look at life determines what you do with it, and what you do with it, in turn, determines the level of success you experience. This is the true cause of productivity. The following story illustrates the 64 Million Dollar Question: If internalized thoughts determine our fates, how does it get internalized in the first place? And how can I use it to achieve success?

  “Self-suggestion makes you the master of yourself.” ~W. Clement Stone.

  The Power of Internalized Thoughts: A Personal Story In addition to showing you how internalized thoughts ―make things‖, the following story will also explain why I made the claim that the economic ideas I‘ve presented to you are the gospel truth. It has nothing to do with my intellectual capacity, any virtue I may have, the hundreds of hours I‘ve put in to understand economics or 13 years of experience in business. You can forget that I‘m a college professor or that I have an advanced degree. None of this really matters in the end.

  There‘s something else that makes me absolutely certain that what I know about economics is the truth. The following is a true story that explains this confidence…

  When I was a child, I experienced a traumatic event that‘s altered the way I look at the world.

  In order to appreciate the impact the event has had, we must first do a little background check. Since the time I was born until I was about eight years old, I lived in my mother‘s shadow. While my sister moved around, living with my grandmother or our older sister, I stayed with my mother. It was virtual paradise for a young child—the exclusive devotion and love of his mother. I loved my mother more than life itself—she was my entire world.

  At the age of eight, everything changed in an instant. One day, my father showed up. Although I‘d seen him before, I asked my mother who he was, perhaps because it had been so long since he last came around. ―That‘s your father, Akinaw‖, she said.

  My father and his friends sat around and had some coffee. After awhile, my mother pulled me aside to our back porch to talk to me as my father was getting ready to leave.r />
  I could tell something bad was about to happen. My mother kneeled down, looked me in the eyes and said, ―Akinaw, you‘re going to go live in America.‖

  ―No, I don‘t want to go!‖

  ―It‘s for the best, you must go.‖

  ―No, no, I want to stay with you!‖ I cried.

  ―Don‘t worry, you‘ll be able to come visit me.‖

  Tears welled up in my eyes and I began to cry in protest. I refused to

  leave. After awhile, my father walked down the hallway, grabbed my right arm and attempted to pry me away from the only person to whom I‘d given my heart (up until that moment in my life).

  What made the whole event even more traumatic was that I had no warning about what would happen. Almost in a flash, everything I‘d loved was taken away.

  What happened after that initial event is important to understand: That original experience of loss was greatly magnified in multiple ways.

  First, my sister and I had no other relatives when we came to America. In an instant, all our uncles, aunts, fifteen cousins, our grandmother and more disappeared. Secondly, most of our life was spent in Simi Valley, CA where there were no Ethiopians at all or other black kids to identify with. Thirdly, I had no one to talk to about my experience in order to make sure I interpreted it correctly. I may have been asked to talk about the traumatic experience but I didn‘t want to talk about it because of the pain it brought forward. Fourthly, a few years after we arrived, my father and my new mom were having relationship difficulties; they separated then divorced.

  So, the common theme of my childhood was a painful series of sudden and emotional losses—my mother, my father, my family, my culture and my new family.

  The Effects

  That series of losses created psychological effects. As you read, remember that children rarely (if ever), interpret traumatic or emotional experiences positively. 1. Growing up, I kept losing or misplacing just about everything—wallets, money, keys, cameras, jackets, shoes, homework and so on. In class, my mind would wander from one thing to another. Even at home, the inattention and forgetfulness showed up in an inability to complete various chores; a little was done on every project but none was ever finished. This inattention wasn‘t too difficult to handle in high school but college was a much more demanding academic environment.

  Because the responsibilities of a grown up world were fast approaching, every effort was made to control this inattention.

  Thinking that steel-like determination could fix my outer life, I went to great lengths to force myself to become disciplined. At one point, I even began carrying a ruler around so that when my mind wandered, I‘d hit my hand in order to ―consequence my mind for inattention.‖ It was a silly attempt at a B.F. Skinner-ish reward and punishment model for behavior modification.

  You may be able to tell why someone with my emotional experience would choose the sanctioning of punishment as a behavioral modifier—it was a lot easier than admitting the painful but true cause of my inattention. Praying, reading the Bible, punishing myself, all couldn‘t break the inability to focus on any given task.

  The problem became so unbearable, like other people, there was only one thing to turn to in order to enjoy life while avoiding spiritual healing— prescription drugs! After being tested for attention deficit disorder (and passing with flying colors), some relief was finally found (from the symptoms anyway).

  The diagnosis made by highly trained medical doctors was accurate. Multiple tests reinforced the same physical diagnosis. Losing things, inattention and forgetfulness still occurred but much less after the medication. However, there‘s never a sure way to shut our hearts up. It has a way of continually bringing up other events that yell, ―Try again! So you don‘t lose things anymore because you‘re doped up, but does that hide the fact something is still wrong?‖ I‘ve learned that we can suppress what‘s going on in the basement with various types of drugs only for so long.

  Our subconscious mind will find a way to let itself out, eventually showing up in different areas of our lives. If we cover one leak in our deceptive scheme to avoid the truth, another, bigger one pops up somewhere else.

  2. As a result of the early, childhood traumatic experience, the doors of my heart closed to the outside world. The great fertile plains of my soul turned into a waterless desert. It was at that young age of eight that I cried my last, heartfelt tears.

  For the next seventeen years, my life was at best, zombie-like, uninspired, loveless, unemotional and numb. Even my tears (after that point) were unemotional. The goal in every relationship was to keep people out, to never allow them inside, to never give my heart or my trust to anyone and to avoid all feeling as much as possible.

  Keeping everyone out had its costs. On one occasion, after leaving a church group event with some fifty people, I found myself sitting at a red light as empty tears rolled down my cheeks because of loneliness. I had no idea what was going on at the time (I didn‘t want to know).

  3. Obviously, my dating life was affected by the experience of loss in the sense that it was nonexistent! A lot of confused women have sent me vibes without realizing my antenna was emotionally out of commission.

  On one occasion, a few friends were going out and one girl needed a date. As I was sitting alone in my room on my bean bag, playing level 100 of Mario Land on my Gameboy, the phone rings.

  ―Hey Ak, it‘s Jesse.‖

  ―Hey Jesse, what‘s up?‖

  ―We‘re going out and Nicole doesn‘t have a partner, do you want to

  hang with us?‖ Okay, so Nicole was (without nostalgic exaggeration) one of the prettiest girls in school, something that had not escaped my notice. So what did I do? After looking around for an excuse, none could be found. It was Friday night, I was alone in my room and because I had been playing Super Mario Land for so many hours, even my bean bag was yelling, ―Get off me you fat-ass, you‘re making me sweat!‖ In the other corner, my cat (that I had locked in my room to keep me company) was slitting his wrist.

  ―Sorry Jesse, I‘m actually going out with some friends tonight.‖ 4. Even in my religious choices, the experience of loss played a major role. In the Protestant camp, there are two major philosophies of God-thought. One is called Arminian (named after the theologian Arminius) and the other is called Calvinism (named after the famous John Calvin).

  I liked Calvinism because it taught that if God wants to save you, it will happen and there‘s nothing that could keep it from happening. In other words, nothing could pry a believer from God‘s Kung-Fu grip—there was no conditionality or possibility of severance. Calvin even taught that if you‘ve been predestined to be saved, if you‘re chosen, you yourself can‘t do anything to screw up those plans.

  Because I‘d lost the most precious relationship of my life (among other things), it should be obvious why the idea of a personal, eternal and forever relationship with a loving God was so appealing. It stood against the transitory nature of this world of change. I didn‘t want to believe in a world of flux.

  On one occasion, after reading a small book entitled, ― The Five Points of Calvinism‖, I felt a warm, sweet glow spontaneously fill my heart. It was felt, because after a lifetime of running from the realization of the impermanence of love (and the anxiety associated with it), I found something that would last (into eternity no less). In my view, on this side of eternity was Now- Love, but on the other, Forever-Love.

  Lasting Wealth : The emotional need for finding things that last has driven me (unconsciously) to seek out permanent ways of building wealth. It should not come as a surprise that I have a book entitled, ―Of Permanent Value: The Story of Warren Buffett‖ on my shelf. The ideas that I‘ve presented in my letters are the surest way of building permanent wealth, something better than I could have consciously come up with.

  5. On the opposite side of my office on a book shelf sits a reminder of the ―old me.‖ A book on logic full of underlined sentences and notes in the margins. The book was neit
her assigned for a class nor was it a present. It was elective reading, bought with my own money when I was twenty years old. Next to it is a book on the history of philosophy entitled, Thales to Dewey. Over the last dozen years, I‘ve spent thousands of dollars on books—my appetite for knowledge was enormous.

  But why would I do so? What makes a young person give up going to parties to stay home and read about syllogisms, axiomatic systems, Godel‘s theorem, string theory, and philosophical history? I wasn‘t making out with girls, drinking beer with my buddies, bowling, cruising or trying out for a sports team. It‘s not the norm to choose to do what I was doing. Here‘s why I did choose those things…

  Because no comfort or joy could be found in human relationships, I turned to books of all kinds. Why books, why knowledge? The most important reason was because no one can take knowledge away from you.

  By accident, somewhere along the line, I found out (unconsciously) that knowledge was a thing of permanent value and began to ―empty my purse into my head.‖ Because knowledge was permanent, I began to feel again. At last, I can love something and it couldn‘t be taken away from me. But I soon found out that no amount of knowledge was ever enough. It was a drug. I was a user. I had to keep learning in order to stay alive. Life stopped when I put down a book.

  A deep need to fill up the hole drove me to suck into my mind as much knowledge as was possible—history, theology, economics, psychology, epistemology, classics, archaeology, physics, philosophy and much more. The most intriguing subject for me was epistemology, which seeks to answer how we know what we know and how we"ll know we know it when we do. It"s an attempt to know what truth is.

  The word epistemology is made up two Greek words—episteme (knowledge) and logos (study). You can call it truthology (this is one of the most important things to understand about why the letters you hold in your hands are so valuable).