So let me tell you why I want money, because I do want it and I am not going to perform modesty about it.
I come from a country that is occupied by a communist regime. They arrested me when I was a kid. They put my father in a concentration camp. They are killing my people.
When I was a loser, I could not help myself. When I was broke, I could not help my family. When I made a little more money, I could help my family. When I had a little more than that, I could help my community.
Read that ladder again, because every rung is me with a different amount of money and nothing else different about me. I did not become wiser or kinder between the rungs. The only thing that changed was how many people I could reach, which means the money was never the achievement. It was the radius.
Same desire for money, two completely different engines. What makes mine hold up in month three?
That it points at people who are not me. I am empowered with my money to do the right thing and to serve humanity, and that purpose does not evaporate on a night when I am tired, because the people it is for are still in trouble whether I am tired or not. So money is empowerment. That is the whole difference.
Test it against my own marriage, since I have already put it in front of you. If my wife had married me for money and a nice house, look at what she bought. I was a refugee. I was broke. I did not have money. I had nothing. She could have given up on the relationship at any point in those years and nobody would have blamed her. We stuck together instead, and that is why there is a better life here now.
Now compare it to the version that fails. You want money to buy a Chanel bag, or a BMW. That is the man who wants to marry a woman because her father owns a company. Is there true love in that? Do you expect that relationship to end in happiness? Nothing is wrong with chasing money, and I want to be clear that I am not asking you to want less of it. I am asking you to reset what it is for, which is a different instruction and a much easier one.