To follow our calling we need to get clear on what we’re doing for whom and why we’re doing it. The word ‘deserve’ comes into play and starts to mess with our minds about what we’re doing. If we feel like they don’t deserve (fill in the blank), we’re going to have a hard time living our calling.
From wiktionary.com, ‘deserve‘ is defined as:
To be entitled to, as a result of past actions; to be worthy to have.
There is a lot of “they don’t deserve …” going around lately. We hear on the street anger over wealthy people. Even our President got into it, deriding “fat cats” on wall street and telling business owners they didn’t build their business. All of this implying that if someone becomes wealthy, they don’t deserve that – they aren’t worthy of it and aren’t entitled to it.
This type of thinking can absolutely stop of us from pursuing our calling – especially if what we’re doing is valuable such that we should be paid doing it. This is because “they don’t deserve” quickly translates into “I don’t deserve” in our subconscious minds. We feel like we aren’t worthy of it, and we aren’t entitled to it even if we put in the work to earn it.
So we respond in one of two ways:
- We sabotage our efforts
- We give away our goods or services
When we sabotage our efforts, of course, we are stopped completely from living our calling. We are stuck.
When we give away our goods or services, or sell them at or below cost, we hurt ourself. Either we need to have a second job to make ends meet, or we end up just scraping by. Either way, we don’t end up thriving in our calling.
‘Deserve’ is not a word I like to use. I think it’s better to use the word, ‘Earn’. What about you? What do you think about wealthy people? Do you see them as earning and deserving their wealth, or do you see them as greedy selfish people?
