Abundance vs. Scarcity Mentality

So something that I was reading in one of my class readings was about how as leaders, we ought to operate under an abundance mentality rather than a scarcity mentality. In other words, we ought not think that another's success takes away from our own. In fact, the idea that other's gain takes away from our own comes from a place of egocentrism. To feel threatened by another's success is a sign of our own own insecurity.

Beyond the realm of leadership, operating from a paradigm of abundance has great potential to open our hearts to a new way of being in the world.

What if we let go of fear and embraced challenge?
What if we stopped protecting our own assets and learned to be generous?
What if we stopped being stingy with our time and learned to give an extra 20 or 30 minutes to listen to the heartache of another without unburdening our own hearts of their sorrow?

So often we do not do the things we ought because we feel that we lose something in doing them and we fear being sucked dry.

While this does not mean that we ought to have no boundaries and let others TAKE, TAKE, TAKE without ever asking for our own needs to be met, I do think that this requires us to leave behind an adolescent egocentrism in favor of true Christian generosity.

I think St. Francis got this right:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;

where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon:

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope

where there is darkness, light

where there is sadness, joy

O divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love;

for it is in giving that we receive,

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.