When someone comes to you and tell you, “I want to be rich!”, how do you react?    You can react in several ways:

1. You could say that you are already richer than me.
2. You could also react by saying, “So do I”.
3. You could also look at them with distaste.

A lot of people say that they want to be rich but in most cases it is a wish rather that what they actually want.   During the end of the Japanese occupation in Malaysia (known as Malaya at the time), a lot of people were rich, they had millions in the Japanese currency known as “Banana Money” – you could say that they were all millionaires.  However, the money was useless.

It seems that we have all been mind washed that whenever anyone tells us they want to be rich, we automatically we think of physical and monetary terms.

However, note that there are other types of “richness”. 

Other kinds of Wealth

A person can be considered rich if they have a family filled with love. 

A person can be considered rich if s/he has friends who will always ready to jump into his/her defence at anytime.

A person who thinks he is rich is indeed rich. 

Reason

Even if they want to want to be rich in the financial type.  We need to understand what the reason.  It could be because they are just trying to keep up with the Jones. 

I remember a story I heard once:

A relatively well to do salesman (let’s call him “John”) was on holiday on an island.  He came across a person (let’s call him “Jacob”) on the beach. 

As John got to know Jacob, he found out that Jacob did not have any permanent job to speak of and was in he beach most of the time and will pick up scraps from it to sell to buy his daily meals.   His house is a run down hut near the beach. 

John found Jacob to be very intelligent and capable person.   John wanted to help his new friend and spoke to him.   “Jacob, how would you like to come to work with me?  I think I can help you progress in our company!”

With that, Jacob said, “So how does that work?”

John said, “You work a few years, get promoted to manager then maybe a director and later on retire rich.” 

Jocob then said, “What do you do after you retire?”

John said, “When you retire, you can go to a remote tropical island and laze around all day.”

Jacob did not seem impressed.  He just said, “I am already doing that”.

Conclusion

So next time somebody says they want be rich, you should first ask what they mean and next ask them why.