abundance is nature's law |
Scarce/Poor/Limited Programs (SPLP) What is scarcity, limited or poor programming? You will remember that ever since the evolution of life on this planet, there has not been enough food for most of the animals and insects. Many of them starve to death. Scarcity of food has been the rule among the lower species. As we have already mentioned, in the human history too we find pervasive scarcity in all the fronts. Food has been scarce from the very beginning till now. Even today in many parts of the world a number of people are starving. There are whole societies who are in abject poverty. Famine and draught have made people’s life miserable in large areas of Africa and Asia. A World of plenty is an impossible dream for them. No wonder many humans still live out of a deep seated and pervasive scarcity-orientation that colors how they see the world. It is as if they wear scarcity spectacles that distort their vision. They see resources as limited or scarce, just like a blue glass make everything blue. In the ancient times, the societies were scarcity communities. If anyone took more than ‘his fare share’ of what food was available he would be seen as evil. If he tried to hoard some food for difficult times ahead, that was a greater evil. Even if one produced more than his needs he could not take more than the others or save the surplus. This could be the reason why so many people still see profit and wealth making as evil. The limited food resource brought in the ‘fare share’ principle. This has been handed over from generation to generation. Your own parents have been victims of this sort o a scarce/poor/limited program. That is why they often reminded you not to waste even a grain of rice or other food food-stuff. Most of the parents say: “Don’t waste food. There are so many starving today;” “Be careful with money; they do not grow on trees.” “Spend every penny carefully.” You learnt much of your SPLP from them. They had a mental orientation that no matter whatever they do their money hunger would not be satisfied. The no-solution-orientation acts like a self actuating expectation. This has strengthened your belief that your unsatisfied money hunger will persist forever. You came to believe that whatever you do to mitigate your money hunger will not work. And that ultimately, scarcity will be perpetuated. Victim Mentality There is a universal thinking that the starving people should be helped by providing them with the survival needs. Victim mentality may have its origins in the helpless phase of infancy. We are all born as helpless babies totally dependent on our parents. They have to provide us with our survival needs. And later we felt we were victims of our surroundings or environment. In a poor house we shared its pain, poverty and desperation. Most of the neighborhood was in abject poverty too. As a result, many of us developed a helpless, victim-mentality. This is an orientation distorting our vision and influencing our entire lives. Imitation Scarcity outlook and victim mentality has a lot to do with the way we imitate those all around us. Imitation is a significant contributor to the growth of the victim mentality. We observe what our parents think and do and we imitate them thinking that it is the only way to survive. In the primitive communities ‘fair share’ was a powerful survival idea. If an animal was hunted and killed by one or a few together, the practice of sharing it with the community helped everyone’s survival. Thus the ‘fair share’ idea was accepted by one and all. Imitation can be wrong at times. ‘Fair Share’ could be seen as a relic of the primitive past. It worked in those conditions. But it has no relevance now. Your parents, and to a smaller degree the society at large, have been responsible for inculcating this idea into you. Your parents often forced you to share your toys with the other kids. They must have often reminded you about being selfish and exhorted you not to be like that. (I do not mean that selfishness is a good quality but that such an approach could have contributed to the evolution of the strong ‘fair share’ concept in you.) Other Scarcity Experiences You may have had a number of other scarcity experiences that led to a Pervasive Scarcity Program in your mind: 1 Scarcity of food-especially scarcity of food that you enjoyed. 2 Scarcity of dresses and other personal wear items 3 The limited number of admissions available from nursery to college level. 4 Limited number of seats in the professional institutions. 5 Limited membership in sports teams, debating clubs, choir and so on. 6 Scarcity of friends from the opposite sex. 7 Scarcity of good jobs. 8 Scarcity of money to meet your ever increasing demands. As most of humans suffer from a pervasive SPLP societies have been organized to adjust accordingly. The Observation of the Hunger project In 1977, Wisner Erhard launched the ‘Hunger Project’ He identified scarcity, no-solution-inevitability as being at the root of the world hunger. These orientations are pervasive forces that pervade their lives. Their perceptions and expectations are revolving around scarcity. This influences their thoughts and actions in a devastating way. They expect hunger and scarcity all the time. Their thoughts and actions are in synchrony with their expectations. And thus hunger and scarcity become the reality. If anyone is stuck in the scarcity orientation, he will not put efforts to produce more or think of ways to overcome the situation. They surrender themselves to their destiny and beliefs. They become very lazy and hardly do anything to overcome their predicament. Your mind need not have to accept any limits any more. There is no need for the ‘fare share’ concept now. We can produce any amount of food. All of us can become rich. There is plenty of everything here for making food, money or anything. It should be shifted to conscious imitation. Make sure what you imitate is worth imitating. Consciously choose what to imitate. You can try to test the thing to see whether it works before imitating (of course it may not be possible during childhood when many of our modeling take place.) But now we can choose. Further, what was true in the past need not be true any more. So far nobody wanted you to be a total individual. Your parents, educators, and the society wanted you to live in a specified way as per the accepted and prevalent codes. Your individuality has been stifled. Hear what Krishnamurthy, the famous thinker says: “Your parents are frightened, your educators are frightened, the governments and religions are frightened of your becoming a total individual because they all want you to remain safely in the prison of the environmental and cultural influences.” . It has been proved beyond any reasonable doubt that you have to change your beliefs of Scarcity into beliefs of abundance to realize your dreams. Do we have scarcity today? Not at all. A scarce resource outlook is a mistaken idea. It needs to be changed. Reprogramming our brains consistent with the realities of today is an essential step towards success. If you make enough wealth, does your creation take away others’ fair share? Not at all. What you make is in addition to what others produce. There is unlimited wealth potential in the world. Anyone can make as much wealth as he wants. There is no limit and there is ample scope to make any amount, any thing. Wealth is a form of energy. And there are infinite resources of energy in the world. We are not tapping even one millionth of the energy that comes to the earth from the sun. Abundant food or wealth could be produced, abundant electricity could be produced and abundant amenities could be developed. We have to shift our perspective from ‘Victim State’ to master of our destiny approach. We have to understand that whatever the human mind can conceive and believe it can achieve. |