just because she's beautiful doesn't mean you aren't - part II - scarcity thinking

Part I is HERE.

We live in a world where everyone's "bright shiny new thing" that is happening to them is visible to us. We have always sort of lived in this world, our world is just a whole lot bigger now (or smaller depending on how you look at it), so there are a lot more bright, shiny new things to see.

When we were kids and the neighbors got a new car, everyone probably hopped in for a ride and then we walked home with parents wondering aloud if the Browns could really afford that. Or maybe, if we were lucky, we walked home with parents excited for their friends' good fortune.

I want to be the person excited for everyone else's good fortune.

(and yes, I know as soon as I write this, life will offer me the opportunity to learn how to do this through practice by providing some really great fortune to someone I know - I hope it is YOU - please buy a lottery ticket and ... remember your friend Cat from Jersey)

I don't want to be the person grumbling to myself about how someone could be on vacation again. But I am. The grumbler, I mean. I want need to stop.

And yes, I know that everything isn't as wonderful as it seems in Facebook land and other public places. I realize I cannot be comparing my inside to someone else's outside unless I am determined to come up short (my inside is probably a rather messy place after all).

But there is some kind of scarcity mindset at play here.

I truly know we either live in a world of lack or a world of abundance and we get to live in the world we believe we live in. Yup, it's as simple as that.

I know this. It doesn't always stop the grumbles though.

(although a slice of pizza might - giving up dairy is making me batshit crazy folks)

The topic of scarcity interests me because I never feel as if I have enough time.

I know this is just something I believe. I also know this is not an absolute truth. It is just something that I have made true for me. I am determined to un-make it.

I'm busy, You're busy. We're all busy. Some people though are still creating time for hobbies and vacations and to get their car registered online before it's too late and they have to waste half a day at the DMV and they find the time to pay their credit card before the $35 late fee kicks in and to get to a freakin' dentist.

Psychological research has shown that when we experience emotional deprivation in childhood, this feeling of not being important or lovable enough can persist into adulthood as a “deprivation mindset.”

(since I am a student of evolutionary astrology I am not so quick to blame our childhood, since I believe we pretty much magnetized ourselves into exactly the situation we not only needed to be in, but that we were already a match for)

We may never feel as if we have enough of the things we need.

And actually this post is starting to feel like the leaky cup stuff  I wrote about almost 2 years ago (see time really is flying!), and the timing of this makes perfect sense to me actually (more on that later).

This "not having enough of the things we need" can show up as money stuff (I know from my days in banking that almost no one ever thinks they have enough money, no matter how much they actually have) and relationship issues, but any perception of lack can have its roots here.

This scarcity way of looking at things; this thinking that someone else having something means there is less for us is an unconscious thing. 

(it's not like I think someone has actually taken my seat on that airplane to Mexico after all)

But it affects what we notice, how we weigh our choices, what we decide and how we behave.

It's a bit like negative thinking - negative thinkers can reach the finish line just like positive thinkers can (I don't actually believe in finish lines, but I think you know what I mean here).

Positive thinkers see the opportunities and are able to act on them, negative thinkers see the problems and are able to avoid them. Both ways of thinking can get us from A to B - one of them is just a hell of a lot more fun and is nicer for others to be around. I think my own life could be a hell of a lot more fun and less frantic with some mindset tweaks. Next post I will tell you what I am doing and you can see if anything resonates with you and might be helpful..

UP NEXT - just because she's beautiful .... part III - how to know there is enough for us