Wealth: Paradox, Addiction and You
by Miki Saxon
Early last year I wrote, “Wealth addiction isn’t a case of wanting to get rich; it is a case of nothing is enough.”
From the outside, Mark Cuban is a good example. He considers the slightly-over-$30K gets per episode for Shark Tank too low, which makes one wonder what he gets to act like a fool in that (IMHO) stupid AT&T commercial.
He certainly doesn’t need the money, so why do it? Is it simply wealth addiction or something else?
The paradox of success is this: The mental wiring that enables a person to claw to the tippy-top of Corporate America or sports or entertainment or any other field that offers vast wealth is the same mental wiring that most of the time leads people not to retire before they have to — no matter what the diminishing marginal utility of money would suggest.
But there are those similarly wired for success who manage to miss the addiction and sidestep the paradox.
Four recent, high-profile examples are Patrick Pichette, the 52-year-old chief financial officer of Google, Patrick Willis, 30, a San Francisco 49ers linebacker, Jason Worilds, a 27-year-old linebacker for the Pittsburgh Steelers and 26-year-old Jake Locker, a Tennessee Titans quarterback.
These four are great proof that neither mental wiring nor predisposition eliminate choice.
Because it’s your mind, which means it’s under your control.
Image credit: DonkeyHotey
