Happy day to you. This is Ken Kaufman, and I am thrilled you’re here for Episode Number 74, “Abundance.” Now, I want to share a quick experience with you that I had this last weekend. And to set that up, I just want to share, kind of, an overarching principle. And then I think it’ll help all of us to just, sort of, pull out the application of this principle in our lives, and especially how we think about our money and trying to get ahead and move forward with our financial plans. So, abundance has an antithesis from a mindset perspective, and it has scarcity. Abundance is somebody who sees there as being more than enough opportunity for everybody and being truly excited and happy about other people succeeding with their money. Whereas a scarcity mentality takes the mindset of, “Well, if somebody else is successful, then that means I’m not going to be or there’s not as much available for me to try to accomplish my financial goals.”
So, let me share this experience. I had an opportunity to participate in a triathlon. It’s the first one I’ve done in several years. I had done several back, you know, five, six years ago. And then it’s been a little while, and my son had signed up and I decided first I was going to go watch him. And then before I knew it, my brother and nephew were going out and participating. And so, before I knew what, I was signed up to participate in this triathlon and did a little bit of training beforehand, was not nearly as prepared as I should have been, but it ended up being a good experience. But here’s the key takeaway that I had. When we’re out there “competing” in this race, starts with a swim and then a bike and then a run, the three different components, all those, the times for each role added together and everybody out there is trying to get the shortest or, you know, the lowest time.
The winner is the one out of all the groups that gets the lowest of all the times. And then they break it up into age groups and genders and different things. And there’s even…if you’re over a certain weight, you can be in what’s called the Clydesdale or the Athena groups, just to try to put you in groups that, you know, would be people that it would make more sense to compete with. And here’s the interesting thing. When the first swimmers went into the water and started swimming and they came out of the water, the people who hadn’t gotten in the water yet were standing there clapping for them and cheering for them.
And I found that as well coming out of the water. And then we got on our bikes and we started riding. And here’s the interesting thing. I passed some people, not very many, but I did pass a few. I think all of them passed me in the run. So, don’t think that I’m this amazing triathlete or anything. But as I passed people, I just felt this compelling idea to say something positive to them because they’re out there working hard and trying their best. Everybody’s showing up with their best effort. And so, I’d say things like, “Hey, good job. You’re doing great. Keep it up,” and, you know, as I would pass them on the bike. And then when other people would pass me, sometimes they’d say, “Hey, good job.” Or if they didn’t, I’d say, “Hey, great pace, ” or ” It’s looking good.” or… I don’t know. There’s a myriad of things that came out of my mouth. All of them, I was just trying to be positive.
And others responded when I said, “Hey, great job.” They’d say, “Hey, thanks, you too,” as they passed me. It blew by me in some instances. So, we get in from the bike and then get out on the run, same thing. “Hey, great job, good job.” And I would say, I would prompt it sometimes, sometimes the people passing and in this case, on the run. It was an out and back course, which meant the people ahead of me were literally running back in as I was still going out to the end of the course, or at least to the turnaround point. And there’s all this feedback back and forth. And as I was going through this event, it took me, you know, an hour and 50 minutes roughly to do the whole thing.
And I know I’m slow as molasses. But the interesting thing that I was thinking about was, “Wow, everybody out here has this abundance mentality they’re showing up with and everybody’s giving their best effort. Nobody’s…you know, came out here to not try their best. And everybody’s just acknowledging it and whatever place you come in or anything else, that was much, much less important than everybody just competing against themselves and trying to make themselves better and looking for ways that they could improve themselves and not worried about who around them was succeeding or losing in the process.” It was an amazing example to me of the abundance mindset and mentality. And that positivity absolutely is a sticky attitude, meaning the more positive we are, the more we have this abundance mentality that we’re not actually competing against anyone or that if somebody else wins that somehow we lose in the process.
It’s about us…everybody’s showing up with their best effort and truly rejoicing in other people’s successes. And of course, we feel pain and sorrow when others are struggling and we don’t gloat over that and say, “Well, now that means I can get ahead and I’m better than them, or I make more money than them, or my net worth is greater than them.” I truly believe this is a sticky attribute that when you take this attitude of abundance, that abundance truly comes your way. And when you take the attitude of scarcity, then scarcity comes your way. And that’s, kind of, the overarching principle and thing that I just wanted to mention as we all work on our financial plans and our investment strategies and trying to figure out, you know, how to achieve the financial goals that we’re setting for ourselves on a daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, wherever, you know, every 10 years.
I believe that the more we have an abundance mentality and not a scarcity mentality, the more likely we are to achieve our goals. We look around and we realize that somebody else’s success actually raises the tide and all boats float higher as a result in that Marina, for example. And so, I just want you to stop and think about your mentality and your mindset. And I believe that when we all embrace and truly embrace an abundance mentality, not a scarcity mentality, it puts us on a better track and creates better opportunities. And all of a sudden it’s like, “Hey, good job. Hey, good phone. Hey, nice net worth.” I mean, not that we share that with each other, “Nice bank account, nice investment portfolio.” As we truly rejoice in other people’s successes, I think that that sticks to us and gives us more opportunity to be successful.
So, no more looking around, no more, “I have to keep up with the Joneses” or anything like that. We show up and bring best effort and we need to feel good about our best effort, regardless of what that means, what ranking we have or where we fall in the race, or if somebody has got a bigger investment portfolio than us or anything else. We only are showing up to compete against ourselves. And the competition is, are we bringing our best effort? Period. Has nothing to do with how anybody else is playing the game or finishing the race. Are we bringing our best? And are we putting forth our best effort when it comes to our financial lives?
Well, I hope this has been helpful. I couldn’t help, but during this race, my mind just kept going around and around this abundance versus scarcity mentality. And I’m grateful for everyone that was out there on that course who took that positive influence and took that abundance mentality. And well, it was fun to be out there in “compete.” Everybody knew the Gray’s Competition was against ourselves. So, hopefully, this will help you. Many, many thanks to you for joining today.
This is a wrap for Episode 74. Happy day.
