Approaching my fortieth birthday, and having never had a job - at least, not a nine to five - I thought it would be interesting to take a look at some of the ways in which so many people are kept "inside the box".

Schools and the home is where it all starts. Do you remember the early days of your childhood, when you were happy to take on anything, when you loved life just for the moment and weren't afraid of bills, tax men, mortgages and so on?

At five or six years old, we were all happy to volunteer answers, even if we didn't know them! We were happy to get on a bike, give it a go, fall over then get back on again. Yet, by the time most people are 15 - 20 years old, enthusiasm has waned, fears have set in, risks are harder to take.

In this issue, I want to look at why this is, so that we can all review where we are, what we are doing, and how to make changes that we want to happen.

Let's look at some of the ways we are subtly taught to be poor.

How many of you are familiar with any of the following terms?

"Money doesn't grow on trees!"

"We can't afford it"

"Money doesn't buy you happiness."

"You have to work hard to be rich"

"They don't deserve that".

Any of those strike a chord with fellow readers? You may well have made your own way in the world, and there is a chance you may have had enlightened teachers or parents who did not say any of the above, but my guess is that the vast majority of us nod our heads when we hear these phrases, and say "yes, I remember Mom or Dad, or Uncle Joe saying that to me".

How about this one?

"That's way too risky."

This is usually a comment about investing of some kind, when the alternative is saving. The wealthy invest all the time and keep generating more. The poor and middle class save money and never have any to spare.

At school, we're taught that the best thing to do is to learn all the nonsense they throw at us, so that we can go out there and get a good job. A safe job. A secure job. But in the world of electronic communication and the internet, this has to be some of the worst advice. Why get a job, when companies come and go, people make fortunes and lose them and make them again, almost in the blink of an eye?

There is certainly nothing safe about a normal job if all you have to fall back on is the state/government pension. Who knows what is going to happen to government coffers when the baby boomers all reach retirement age? If governments turn round and say "Err, sorry we can't afford it", what do those people do? They'll be wishing they had "taken risks" investing instead of backing the government donkey.

Money doesn't buy you happiness

That's another classic. Yes, of course, money doesn't buy happiness on its own, but as a friend of mine says, "Yeah, but I'd rather cry in the back of a Rolls Royce than the back of a mini!"

Then there's all the guff about materialism and spiritualism being opposed, which is nonsense. Being wealthy does not make you a charlatan just as being poor does not make you spiritual.

This one often comes down to a religious edict of some kind. Religion is the other great stifler of financial success (unless you happen to be part of the religion's administration, in which case it is just fine for you to accept as much money as possible!). Perhaps the best known challenge to wealth from the Bible is

"It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the gates of heaven".

No kidding! Gee, shucks, I better stay poor then, otherwise we're doomed to a life of roasting on eternal fires.

Yet I ask you this: who can give more to charities, local schools, any good cause? Is it the poor who are too terrified of making money, or the rich, who can donate in large amounts? Just look at what John Paul Getty Jr. has done with a portion of his wealth.

You see how serious that gets? How deeply entrenched are the mechanisms whereby we spurn or reject opportunities that could bring us untold riches?

Then there is the classic:

"The love of money is the root of all evil", which normally gets cut to "Money is the root of all evil". So, the mind is thinking, "Yuk, if I get rich, I'm going to be evil." Not only that, but if I make lots of money, I'll be one of the

"Stinking Rich, the Filthy Rich"

That money stuff sure is bad news. Makes me filthy, stinking, dirty. Don't want that.

So people stay poor. Supposedly safe inside the cosy hologram that is their day to day job, until the economy collapses, or they get made redundant, or they die.

What about:

"Never a borrower or a lender be!" Shucks, that cuts out buying a house, or an apartment, or even a hotel, or how about a chain of hotels - if you're thinking of taking out a dreaded mortgage! Forget the leverage such an investment tactic gives you. No, no, stay inside, watch some "reality" television and don't take any risks!!

OK, that's enough ranting from me. But I hope you see where I'm coming from. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why all these blocks have been put in place. Rulers do not really want all their subjects to become financially independent. When that happens, there is a potential threat to the ruler (whether that is a king, a pope, a priest, a government or a military junta).

Governments worldwide cottoned on to what religions had been doing for centuries: teach the people to be poor, and give the rulers all their wealth! Simple, but very effective.

Now, of course, information can travel around the world at the press of a button, so things are opening up for everybody. People are challenging preconceptions they have long held to be "truths". This is great, because the big myth spouted by government and the media is that there is a finite amount of wealth, that we cannot all be rich at the same time (materially rich that is). This is just as stupid as saying the earth is flat. But then, remember what happened to Galileo when he suggested otherwise!

Poverty consciousness is the phrase used by many wealth-gurus to encapsulate the state of mind people are educated into by parents, teachers and media. I would go further than that, for what happens is that people lose any sense of their own power, their innate value, their ability to achieve success overnight - and we all have these things. Poverty consciousness is actually denial of self. It is "unreality dependence", a state where the individual has accepted the mainstream views and will fight to support them even to his or her own expense.

Changing our own reality is the key to changing our wealth, whether material, spiritual or physical.

It is as easy as waking up in the morning and saying "I am rich".