The Seven Deadly Money Sins to Never Commit

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Money sins are everywhere. Temptations seduce you to part with your money even when you logically don’t want to. Just like there are the seven deadly sins, there are seven deadly sins when it comes to your money. Don’t commit them otherwise you will be left a broke person.

Money is an emotional subject. People dislike talking about it because it causes them to feel something. What happens if you add more emotions around that emotional subject? Bad things happen. A volcano of emotions erupt and money flies out of the volcano to the hands of others.

You don’t want this to happen. You spent hours and years of your life building that volcano to where it is. Did you really work that hard for someone else to have it by the end of it? The saying is that everyone wants your money in one way or another. Some are deserving of it, most are not.

It’s good to spend money in moderation. However, resisting temptation is downright impossible for some. If you want to stop temptations, the first step is to identify what the temptations are. The money sins are apparent and is everywhere. As soon as you walk out of your house, there’s an ad within minutes bombarding you.

Be strong and avoid these temptations at all costs. After you avoid it for decades, you will amass a sizable amount of money. Then you can loosen the belt slowly to indulge in these temptations. However, until you figure out how to use self control to your advantage, it’s not a good idea to submit to them.

Don’t let emotions control your decisions, but let logic dictate what you should do with your money.

The Seven Deadly Money Sins

One of the deadliest money sins is not SMASHING that social share button and posting to your favorite social media! Your friends might be committing these sins themselves and it could help better their personal finances. It’s not easy to resist these temptations. We’re all human after all.

However, the best way to fight these sins are through knowledge. If one article share can monumentally help your friends money lives, there’s no reason not to!

Money Sin #1: Pride

Pride is when you let your ego and emotions get in the way of doing what’s right. One of the biggest money sins is to flaunt your wealth. That’s not the right way to approach money. There is absolutely no need to show off your wealth, status, and money. You don’t need to let others know how well you’re doing.

You can just let the results speak for themselves. Practice stealth wealth and stay invisible from society. Whether others think that you are poor or rich, it doesn’t matter. What matters is are you actually poor or rich. When I go out in public, I go out in t-shirt and jeans. I don’t wear Gucci or any fancy clothing.

Clothes are just so I can stay warm. Nothing more. There’s no need to peacock and throw your weight around to attract attention to yourself. After a while, you’ll enjoy the privacy more so than the attention. Living your life through quiet enjoyment is blissful.

There are no people’s expectations to manage and you don’t need to prove yourself to anyone.

Money Sin #2: Sloth

Money sins, being a sloth and not working hard.
Don’t be a sloth, work hard.

Whether we like it or not, hard work is usually rewarded through money. Money isn’t given to us, we have to go out and earn it. After you earned enough money, you can commit sloth, one of the money sins. When you have enough passive income that covers your expenses, then it’s OK to be lazy.

You don’t need to go out and work for your money. Your money works for you. However, before you can get to the magical land of financial independence, you have to work for it. Everyone wants to keep their money. No one wants to hand out money to you without additional work.

This is a money sin that you can absolutely control to never commit. Effort requires zero skill. It is completely up to your attitude and willingness to work that makes the difference. Don’t only work 40 hours a week and complain that you can’t get ahead. You don’t need to have 10 side hustles but just an additional side hustle will do.

Money Sin #3: Envy

Envy is a part of money sins that is completely unncessary. Stop comparing yourself to others. Others are on a different path of life than you. Don’t keep up with the Joneses if your life goals are different. If your friend got a brand new promotion with a fat raise, so what?

It doesn’t matter how much money someone makes, it matters how much they keep, anyway.

Stop caring about what others are doing and start caring about what you’re doing. By focusing on others, you begin to lose your own identity. Envy is one of the hardest emotions to get over because we’re all human. I see my friends reaching “Manager” status when we graduated around the same time.

Or going to business school to get an MBA. I’m nowhere near close to being a Manager as my job title. Yet, I don’t feel jealous. Also, I will never ever get an MBA because it’s a waste of time and money. Instead, I celebrate their successes. It’s the same way for you. Your friends’ successes are not your failures.

Celebrate them and congratulate them.

Money Sin #4: Gluttony

Money sins, overindulging
Don’t feast and practice gluttony with your money

This is one of the biggest money sins committed by people in a consumerist society. Everyone wants more, bigger, and faster of something. Don’t overindulge. Live a minimalist lifestyle where you have just enough to live on plus a few extra. Excessive consumption is wasteful and there’s no need to have extra stuff.

We need less than we think in order to survive. All we need is food, water, clothes, shelter, electricity, and wi-fi in order to survive and live a better than average life. The government and companies knows this. However, they don’t care. They continue to perpetuate the myth that you need more stuff.

They need to pump the economy up as much as possible.

Why? If their economy isn’t good, they don’t have power against other countries in the world. Don’t get sucked into the consumerist message where more is better. Less is more. When you are happy with what you have, you have inner peace. Don’t let gluttony stop you from seeing a clearer picture.

Money Sin #5: Wrath

Money sins, wrath towards spending.
Wrath and money shouldn’t mix.

Wrath is anger. Have you ever done what’s called “angry spending” or “revenge spending”? It’s when you are so consumed by your anger that you don’t care about anything else. So you go on Amazon or your favorite shopping website and buy as much stuff as you can. Without caring about the consequences.

I agree that there is a lot of pent up demand that’s going to influence people’s spending decisions in the future. However, don’t let that anger get to you so much that it actually ends up setting you back years of hard work. Control your spending. It’s fine to spend more than normal because of pent up demand.

It’s not OK to go completely overboard and spend $1,000 in a single day and do it again the next day after. On things that you know you don’t need or are going to use anytime in the future. I plan to spend more than normal but not so much to the point where I can’t even look myself in the mirror anymore.

Anger and money sins shouldn’t mix.

Money Sin #6: Greed

Greed is when you want more money for the sake of having more money. There are no other reasons besides having more money. It’s one of the most classic money sins out there there. People generally want more money. Whether you have a lot doesn’t matter. Whatever you have, you probably want more of it.

There comes a tipping point where you have too much money. Where having additional money is not going to bring you more joy or security. But you have to have it because well, it’s money! That is greed. Having a little bit of excess is fine. Having too much excess is not.

If at the end of your life, you have a billion dollars leftover, was it really worth it? Did you really need to have that much money? It’s OK if you just did it for self actualization purposes. However, wanting more money for the sake of wanting more money is greedy.

Don’t get sucked into the idea that “having more is better”. It’s not better.

Money Sin #7: Lust

Lust is when you have an unhealthy obsession with someone or something. In relation to the money sins, it’s when you want something too much. You don’t want it, you lust after it. Maybe it’s a shiny new brand new car that you wanted since you were a kid. So you shift your entire focus on trying to possess it.

It’s an unhealthy obsession in the pursuit of unhealthy possession. There are very few things in the world that you should salivate over. Stuff is not one of them. Whether you have the latest and greatest iPhone or whether you have an old iPhone 6s, it doesn’t matter. There’s no need to obsess over it.

Both works just as well and you use it to call your friends, text, or surf the web. Companies use your lust against you. They make it seem like you need and have to have something when that’s not the case. You don’t need to have a lot of stuff just to exist. There is no need.

However, they manipulate and use your lust for their own benefit. Don’t let them do this to you. Be strong.

It’s OK To Commit Money Sins from Time to Time

Money sins are tempting for a reason. We can’t help but feel emotions to these sins and towards money in general. It is completely fine to succumb to these temptations once in a while. I’ve done it so many times before. I will continue to do so in the future.

When I see a decadent chocolate cheesecake on the menu and I’m feeling generous, I buy it. Even if I’m already full and I know I have to burn it off by exercising later. I spent $2,000 on clothes one year. Half of which ended up in the trash. The other half of which, I never wear anyway.

I’m certainly guilty of committing the above money sins from time to time and more times than one. It’s OK to go through life committing them. However, the point is to not do it consistently. Once a year for a couple thousand dollars is completely fine. It’s not going to make or break you.

Treat yourself once in a while. The financial independence journey isn’t supposed to hurt throughout the entire journey. You’re supposed to enjoy the journey while it’s happening. No one supports you being miserable during the journey. It’s necessary to have fun money in your budget so you enjoy life.

I saved up $500 per month of fun money during the lockdown. I plan to unleash this budget once everything opens up again. When you save up $500 per month for almost a year and a half, there’s a lot of fun you can unleash. I’m certain I will not resist a lot of temptations for a couple of months after the lockdowns are over.

That is to say, it is completely fine and even encouraged to indulge once in a while. You deserve it.

Committing Too Many Money Sins Will Ruin You

The other side of the coin is to never commit these money sins often. If you are spending tens of thousands of dollars a month giving in to your urges, it will be difficult to be free. Some people can afford to do something like that. Most people cannot afford to.

One day, you will wake up and realize that you have absolutely nothing to show for all your decades of work. That is the greatest nightmare come into reality. You will realize that everything you worked so hard to build consists of nothing. You were too busy spending instead of too busy building.

We are all human. We have emotions and urges throughout our life. Temptations are everywhere. Don’t let these temptations ruin your life. Can you imagine realizing that you just spend your entire life existing? You didn’t spend your life building something great, you just spent it existing.

Eating and sleeping until the inevitable happens. That’s not right. Live a life that you want to build into something great. We have a dying need for self actualization. We want to see how far we want to take ourselves and push our limits to the max. Money sins will get in the way of that if you let it get in the way of that.

No one’s financial life was ever ruined because they saved too much money. Savings give you security for you to fall back on if something bad happens. The fail-proof sign that you are winning against your temptations if you have a good savings account to fall back on.

Money is not supposed to help you indulge in your wants immediately. It’s supposed to work hard so you can indulge in your wants down the road.

The Seven Deadly Money Sins List:

  • Money sin #1: Pride
  • Money sin #2: Sloth
  • Money sin #3: Envy
  • Money sin #4: Gluttony
  • Money sin #5: Wrath
  • Money sin #6: Greed
  • Money sin #7: Lust

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