Navigating and Regulating Psychological Bandwidth In case you missed our last Blog Post, the topic was psychological bandwidth. We define it as the amount of intellectual, emotional, physical and spiritual energy we have available to think creatively and make effective decisions. Certain feelings use up a lot of psychological bandwidth. Feelings of loss, betrayal, fear, worry, stress, helplessness or hopelessness …

The Power of Our Beliefs Copyright March 31, 2009 by James Gottfurcht, Ph. D. This blog invites you to participate in a contest with prizes for the three people whose responses we believe will be the most beneficial to our readers. In order to allow time for you to respond and for us to select the winners, the next blog …

The Financial Power of the Self-Fulfilling Prophecy Let the dialogue begin! Starting immediately, this blog is open to comments. Here are the responses from one of the three winners from the last blog’s contest. The writer is Marc from Newbury Park, CA. Congratulations, Marc, on your gift of the one-hour Psychology of Money Intro CD. Marc’s Story Think of an …

Who was Adolf Merckle and Why am I Writing about Him? Merckle was a German billionaire who took over a family company with eighty employees in 1967. He turned it into a giant corporation with 100,000 employees. He owned Germany’s largest cement company and amassed a fortune of about twelve billion dollars! With the global economic meltdown, he lost six …

River Rafting your Way to Financial Success When I began teaching UCLA Extension in 1976, I had no idea it would be so much fun. I vividly remember how strange it felt parking in the instructor’s lot for the first time instead of the student’s lot. Not only was I teaching my first class ever, I suddenly realized I would …

To Rationalize or Not? That is the Question. In the last blog, we introduced the six psychological money traps people use to undermine financial and life success, the RAPIDS, which are: Rationalization, Avoidance, Projection of Blame, Idealization, Denial and Splitting. We suggest you read or re-read the previous blog before reading more today. The following two paragraphs represent only a …

Avoidance: The Psychological Money Trap We All Use “Never put off until tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow.” (Mark Twain) Question: Why is procrastination so costly? Answer: Because… Time is money. Accomplishing priorities increases financial success. The early bird gets the worm. It causes “learned helplessness” and “down time.” All of the above are correct We believe …

Why do people behave irrationally with money? Think About The Kinds Of Behaviors Driven By Money: People steal and kill over money—evidence financial crimes and murders People marry or divorce over money—Think, Ana Nicole Smith, the ex-playboy model who married a billionaire who was 63 years older! People worry endlessly about money—The American Psychological Association reported that money is the …