Doctordenky's Blog

My sister has a terrible spending problem.  I consider her a one time millionaire.  The first thing that she asks when she receives money is “How will I spend it” or “What can I buy?”.  Instead, I’m teaching her to ask “How much can I save?” or “How can I make this money grow?”.  I’m trying to teach her how to deal with money and I never realized how little she knows and how distorted the mind can be regarding money.

While we were going through her expenses, I noticed that almost everytime, she has some money lent to a friend or an officemate or that she buys things that are unnecessary or that she has the latest brands of so many things.  She also goes out a lot and I don’t think she doesn’t spend anything during these times no matter how she attests to the contrary.

I can’t help but realize that one of our problems is the inability to say “No” or to admit that we can’t afford something.  This is one of the biggest enemies of financial independence.  So long as one is unable to acknowledge and take steps to counteract this problem, the person will simply be running on the treadmill of paycheck to paycheck living.

“I can’t afford it” is a very decent thing to say.  A person who can say this is honourable.  I don’t think it diminishes him but in my eyes, it elevates the person to his higher self.  Saying I can’t afford it takes courage, self-work, self-love and discipline.  Initially, it is very difficult but I believe that in the long run, all the efforts are worth it.  This is one of the important steps to financial freedom.

The difficulty lies in our inability to distinguish what we have from who we truly are.  We equate money, things and status to better selves.  I’m not saying that money is not important because money is important.  However, money loses value when that is all we have.  It loses meaning when all we can show are the things that money can buy.

The real value of money comes from its ability to enhance people’s lives; its ability to give more meaning to people, to educate, to cure, to show appreciation, to comfort, to bring peace and give dignity.

Let us all work on changing our mindsets about money.  Money is good and it is a very important tool.  Here are some of the things that I have done to nurture my money mindset.

1.  Education.  Financial education is no longer an elective.  It is something that I consider extremely necessary.  The ability to become financially independent does not only rest on the amount of money we earn but also in our ability to keep and grow the money.  Knowledge on these aspects does not always come naturally to us.  No matter how our parents taught us about money, I believe that we still have a lot to learn from other people and that we need to actively seek it out.  Read books and invest on seminars and workshops.

2.  Be in the company of like-minded people.  Financial freedom will only become effortless once we have developed the proper mindset.  We need to spend a lot of time developing this mindset.  All else follows when we are in the proper frame of mind.  Being outside the mindset makes the journey very difficult and often elusive.  Staying in the company of the right people strengthens our belief and opens up possibilities that we never thought of.  We will thrive and grow in this positive force.  This energy is life-giving, health-promoting and wealth-building.

3.  Use money to help other people.  The real purpose of money is to make life better.  After we have reached a certain threshold, the amount of money becomes unimportant.  Helping other people does not necessarily mean giving to charity but may be facilitating other people achieve their own wealth as well.  The best defense against poverty is not by giving alms to the poor but in building a person’s capacity to provide for himself.

I think as a culture, we subscribe to the notion that money is the root of all evil.  When I started my private practice, I had extreme discomfort dealing with money.  I avoided talking about it with patients. I was afraid of overcharging and when negotiating for projects, I felt like I should be thankful that I am given these projects and that therefore, I should not complain about how much I am being paid.  I remember having felt guilty about receiving a big sum of money for a certain project that I executed outstandingly.  I felt money was dirty and that I was bad if I had lots of it.  Deep inside, I wanted to have money but I felt that I didn’t deserve it.  I didn’t think that I can have enough money to satisfy my needs.  I didn’t think that I can get to a point of unimaginable wealth.  I felt that other people can have great wealth but never me.  More than enough money seemed like an illusion and was therefore unattainable.  It was just something you dream about but never get to a point of achieving.  This was my state of mind and this is where the problem lies.

Money can be very emotional.  It has ruined families, ruined friendships and ruined lives.  I think that it is actually “the lack and love of” money which are the root of all evil.  Lack of money causes a desperate father to rob or kill people to feed his family.  Lack of money can cause a women to sell her body and soul to feed her children.  Lack of money can cause people to be corrupt and dishonest.  Lack of money can cause people to do unpleasant and unfavourable things.

“Lack of money” is an illusion.  It is a state of mind that many of us are in.  It is a state of mind of “There is not enough of everybody” or “If I have more, other people will have less”.  “Lack of money” is so imaginary such that a person can continue existing in this state even if he is already wealthy by all standards.

So I started shifting my consciousness towards seeing money in a positive light.  I worked on (and continually do so) seeing money in a positive way from one of bad, evil, dirty to seeing money as a tool that can actually do good.  I worked on shifting from feelings of guilt and unworthiness to one of having a deep conviction that “Everybody has a right to wealth and that it is not bad to aspire for it”.  I convinced myself that it is my responsibility to get to a point of being very wealthy because it is part of my evolution.  It is no longer just about having the money but it has already become a force seeking expression.  It has gone above the plane of the physical to the metaphysical.  What a great idea it is to go beyond worrying about money to sustain day to day needs to one of being able to use money to empower more people and drive them towards achieving their full potential.

Money is not about having more things (although we also shouldn’t feel guilty about having beautiful and worthwhile things around us), status and all the external trappings that come with being successful.  It is about evolution, meaning in life and getting to a point of believing what we are capable.  It is about learning and living the true meaning of abundance.  It is truly a state of mind.  It is about experiencing our capacity to give without thinking that we grow less.  I want to be wealthy because I want to use it to help make other people’s lives more meaningful.  This is my mission.

One of the reasons for starting this blog is to help people realize the importance of setting aside money for healthcare. Even if they have health insurance, even if they feel very healthy, even while they are still young and can’t imagine that they might get sick, even if they have a job and so on, money for healthcare should still be set aside.  There is no room for excuses.

Financial planners always admonish us to start building an emergency fund and our retirement plan.  We save up for buying a car, a house, weddings, birthday celebrations, high tech gadgets and for anything that we wish to acquire.  But we don’t plan and save for being sick.

“Hindi kami handa sa gastos” (“We were not ready for the expenses”)

“Biglaan kasi”  (“It happened so suddenly”)

I often here these words from patients or relatives when they are suddenly stricken with illness.  They sometimes question “Bakit naman nangyari ito sa akin” (“Why is this happening to me?”) or “Bakit naman ngayon pa ito nangyari?” (“Why did this happen now?”).  Most of the time, all I can say is “Ganun talaga” (“That’s just the way things are.  These things really happen”).  You see, life generally doesn’t warn us when it will strike out on us especially when it comes to being sick.  Quite often, there are no warning signals.  It will hit us when it hits us.  No one is exempted (not even doctors).  For a newbie, it is very difficult to comprehend but after seeing them over and over and over, I have realized that the best defense is simply being prepared.  Minimize our risks but still always be prepared for damage.  I have embraced this fact and it felt liberating. That is just the way life is.

If there is something that I am thankful for in becoming a doctor, it is in having realized these things long before they happen to me and I am taking every step I can to be prepared.  Becoming a doctor made me realize how important money is and that I need to learn about the trinity of money and to take this study seriously which is why I became a registered financial planner and continue to educate myself regularly.

I have been practicing medicine for more than 10 years.  Breaking the bad news is already something which is commonplace for me.  I have learned the technique and mastered the art.  But despite that, it still breaks my heart every time I do it.  What crushes me more is when patients’ suffering is compounded by the lack of resources.   It makes the situation bitterly painful.  Hence, it is my obligation to let you know.  Please listen to me.

The title is my favourite quote.  The orginal quote here is “Love makes the world go round” but my experiences made me conclude that “love” should be replaced by “money”.  Before you place your judgements, let me first explain why.

During the course of my clinical clerkship, I came to the conclusion that money is necessary if we want to help people.  Our burning desire to help people and our talents alone will not be enough.  In the hospital, I realized that patients will not do very well if they do not have the money to pay for medical bills.  Another very sad reality is that healthcare is ridiculously expensive anywhere in the world.  I have trained in both private and public hospitals and the situations in these two settings are no different.  Even in public hospitals, healthcare is not free.  Only doctors’ services are free.  The patient has to buy most of the medicines and materials and pay for the laboratory tests.  If the patient does not have the resources, doctors can do minimally to help them.  Even if we give our services for free, if there are no materials to work with, there will be very little benefit to the patient.  There have been countless times when doctors have spent their own money to care for their patients but there is only so much that we can give.

These harsh realities have prompted me to be interested in money…….in making money, in keeping or saving money and in growing or multiplying money.  These 3 components form what I call “The Trinity of Money”.  I am now focusing my money education on all three.  I think it is unwise to leave out any one behind.