the income you want doing work you love, based on your
true purpose. Once again, congratulations to you.- You are living your inherited purpose, perhaps earning less
than you want doing work you don’t like.
Now some examples of inherited purpose. (You may find your-
self listed here.)
- Be strong and don’t feel.
- Take care of others before yourself.
- Don’t disturb anyone.
- Don’t disappoint anyone.
- Act helpless and dependent to get love, care, and attention.
- Follow the rules.
- Rebel against rules.
- Look good.
- Don’t make us ashamed of you.
- Accept the blame for everything.
It is beneficial, but not essential, to identify your inherited pur-
pose at this point. When you declare your true purpose (later in
this chapter) and start living it, your inherited purpose will object,
fearing its eventual demise. It will object more and more loudly un-
til you confront whatever it is. Whatever your inherited purpose,
you can be pretty sure it produces very little in the way of satisfac-
tion, joy, or prosperity.
The degree to which you want to blame someone for what hap-
pened (or didn’t happen) in your childhood indicates the degree
to which unresolved feelings hold you back from the success and
satisfaction you deserve. It’s no one’s fault. Blaming your parents is
futile, even if you have a “case.” By “case” we mean even if you can
prove they are to blame.
Blaming yourself is foolish, too. Typically, children are not com-
pletely aware of their own powerlessness and inability to affect
events. For this reason, they often blame themselves (and continue
to do so into adulthood) for events they could not have controlled,
such as the divorce or even death of their parents. Even without
these extreme events in your life, it’s foolish to think your parents
would have treated you better or at least differently if you had been
smarter, prettier, more talented, or better in some other dimension.
Remember, it’s no one’s fault. Most likely your parents had the
highest intentions for you but a flawed strategy for bringing them
Parental Teaching about Money 77