Money Matters And Don’t You Forget It

You should post this one over at Brazen.

Are you trying to get me pilloried;)?

Hell yes. Thank you, as always, for saying what needs to be said

Of course not. =) But I think a lot of people over there would get something out of it.

Good post! I think – like with anything else – the whole ‘live your passion’ camp often lacks balance. We live in a world where money is absolutely necessary and sometimes that means working a job that is less than ideal. I do believe however that we all have the ability to move towards making a living by doing something that doesn’t make us want to vomit each morning.

What I definitely object to is people who believe that you’re selling out because you work a day job. That just means you’re practical enough to keep a steady paycheck while you build on your passion project.

But I’m probably not the best person to comment on this post as I’m a passion-pusher myself.

Hey Nailah!

I definitely don’t think there’s anything wrong with on-demand passion-pushing –aside from my dislike for the word itself;)– if it’s done in a pragmatic way that takes into account the circumstances of the pushee and is tailored to where they are in life and where they want to be, which I know that you and a few of the other pushers (heh) I know strive to do in your practices.

Most reputable financial/career advice givers (Ramit Sethi, Dave Ramsey) will tell people that their first priority, before taking risks, is to get their debts paid off and a steady income going. So I’m not sure where the tension is here.

Also, I think a statement like “the language and philosophy of self improvement and personal growth absolutely reeks with class privilege,” deserves its own blog post wherein you unpack it instead of just throwing it out there. It could be a really interesting post.

I’ve actually written about the privilege issue in other venues, but I agree that it definitely deserves a post of its own/full discussion in this forum, which is on my (eventual) agenda.

I don’t think you are right in speaking of “self improvement and personal growth philosophy and language reeking with class privilege”. Cathy is perfectly correct is what she has said about advice givers (Ramit and Dave) in that they propose firstly to get the basic correct before you pursue anything further. In fact, if you take a more detailed look through Ramit’s website you will realise that he has an entire section on how to save money on small things. That isn’t the recommendation of someone who feels that they are class privileged.

To be honest, I feel compelled to ask why you would describe it like? What value do you feel you created when you did that?

The thing about class privilege is that the vast majority of the time we don’t even recognize when we’re exhibiting it. It’s rarely something that well-intentioned people deliberately engage in. For example, discussions of higher education, student loan debt, etc. have a classist element to them because of the underlying assumption that education is an option that is open to all This typically disregards the profound effects socioeconomic factors have on determining whether one is even in the position to contemplate amassing student loan debt in the first place. Does that mean that the discussants themselves are malicious? No, it’s simply that they’re not recognizing or acknowledging the privilege dimension of this issue in their discussions. I’ve been guilty of this oversight myself. We (those in the middle class) all have.

I described the rhetoric of personal development as being classist because I truly believe that it is. Does this mean that I’m claiming it’s worthless or unhelpful for a specific audience? Not at all. But it does mean that there is a large segment of the population for whom it doesn’t resonate, who are making decisions (whether by necessity or individual choice) that run counter to this rhetoric. I think they deserve to be counted and for their decisions to be championed as perfectly valid.

As I said in reply to Cathy, this isn’t a new theme in my writing. In 2010, I did a guest blogging series for Bitch Magazine that dealt with privilege issues related to youth culture in greater depth: http://bitchmagazine.org/profile/j-maureen-henderson I encourage you to take a look at it to see where I’m coming from. It’s hard to get that from a one-off post.

Perception is important for a movement. And I feel it’s fair to say that the perception that the “self-help” movement has allowed the world to have of it is this notion of positive thinking, creatively visualizing, and believing your way way to contentment and riches. And that so long as you are worrying about paying bills, you are focusing your attentions on the wrong thing.

“What you think of, you attract, and if you think bills, you will only attract more bills.”

So the perception is that self-help and positive thinking are going to fix everything.

Now, does that mean nobody within those spheres has more practical advice to give? Tempered with the common realities of people who turn to self help for some assistance? No. Apparently these Ramit Sethi and Dave Ramsey people are among those who are aware. But the thing is…I have never heard of either one of them. And I am willing to guess that those who are not privy to the ins and outs, and the “who’s who” within the sphere of self improvement are not either. Yes, if it is something you follow, their names must come up. But to the more CASUAL patron of self help life styles, the face of the movement that is seen is the likes of say, Wayne Dyer. A master marketer with virtually nothing new to say, but who as much as epitomizes the perception many outsider have of the concept.

And why look deeper into the likes of Ramit Sethi, who probably would require a bit of research to discover and understand, when one can’t sling a dead cat in a Border’s without hitting a Wayne Dyer book.

Not that he is evil, or that his readers are. But perhaps it is time to consider that it is his rather simplified, glossy presentation of internal self improvement that gets a lot more air time, and hence the movement itself is not putting its most realistic face forward. Perhaps the struggles, uncertainty, fear, and Maslownian concerns are left out of much of the most popular self-improvement writing for a reason; it isn’t as marketable.

I think the post therefore makes excellent points in regards to this nebulous, “help yourself” mist that hovers over so much of our culture today. A mist that tends to obscure some lesser known people that may have a more realistic approach to self actualization.

I had never heard of Wayne Dyer until my mother mentioned him when I was visiting over Christmas and urged me to Google him to get up to speed. The fact that she, who isn’t at all a part of internet culture or an avid consumer of pop psychology resources, is aware of his name (she’s also familiar with Joel Osteen and his prosperity gospel ways) and work speaks to the ubiquity and pervasiveness of this philosophy in the general pop.