Winning the Lottery vs. Working Hard For Your Money
We can probably relay this to being similar to the age old question about whether it’s better to be good or lucky. I’ve always been one to say that luck is built through hard work, but how can we say that when it comes to the lottery?
Winning the lottery is something that never happens in most people’s lifetimes. We may have five or six $500 scratcher wins, but actually hitting it big with a jackpot is obviously extremely rare.
While I can’t say I wouldn’t want to ever win the lottery – why would I play in the first place if I didn’t want to win – I can say that I’ve always thought about how my life would be different upon winning it big compared to building a business or a career that I can be proud of. As I think about that, here are the reasons I feel it’d be much better to work harder for your money than to end up a lottery winner:
Winning the Lottery Means People Will View You Differently
When you win the lottery people are going to be extremely jealous of you and what you’ve won. They’re going to question why it wasn’t them that made it big. They see a mirror of themselves when they think about you winning the lottery because they’ve purchased the same tickets that you have. They’ll say that you were lucky, which you obviously were, and they’ll begin to resent you for that.
Most people have a healthy respect for people that have worked hard for their money because they don’t see themselves as being able to do the same. Having your own business or working in a hard working job environment gives off the vibe that you truly earned your money and that you deserve everything you have. While luck may have played a part in where you’ve gotten financially, there’s really no doubt in people’s minds that you’re truly entitled to your current financial situation.
The Feeling You Have About Yourself
When you win the lottery, there is going to be an overwhelming sense that says that you didn’t really deserve to win. This may not come immediately, but eventually you’ll start to feel at least somewhat guilty for what’s been given to you. You’ll start to question why you were the one that won it.
Building a financial foundation through hard work is going to have the exact opposite effect. You’ll be proud of yourself and what you’ve been able to accomplish. You’ll know the struggles that you’ve been through to get where you are and you’ll know that you truly deserved the things that have come your way.
Money Gained Through Hard Work is Sustainable
If you’ve been a hard worker all your life and continually increased your financial situation through your hard work then there will be no doubt in your mind that you will always be wealthy in successful. You already have it ingrained and programmed in your mind that you’re a hard worker and you’ve already gone through the process of earning your stripes.
We see over and over again lottery winners that collapsed both mentally and financially because of what the pressure of winning the lottery meant to them. They lost friends because they began to separate themselves from the world after getting beat down by the media and people bombarding them with requests for money.
You Won’t Lose Friends
I always talk about the friends that will be lost if you win the lottery. I don’t think some people realize how large a part their friends play in their lives until they lose them. Winning the lottery is going to leave you with two options when it comes to most friends. You either share with them and they remain your friends or you don’t share with them and they resent you for it. It takes a special kind of person to not be placed in one of those two categories. As disappointing as that may sound, I don’t think that there’s any doubt that that’s the truth, we have to live with when it comes to our friends’ thoughts on us winning the lottery. Think about how you would feel under the same circumstances, if your friend won the lottery.
If you’ve built a financial foundation through hard work, then there’s a good chance you’ve actually developed quite a few friends along the way. Networking is a huge part of building and sustaining a financially stable career and there’s no doubt that you would have picked up some strong friends that respect you for what you’ve been able to do in your career.
In my mind this is an absolute no-doubter. Nothing in this world will ever trump the feelings that come with working hard and earning a living that you can be proud of. Winning the lottery would be awesome, sure, but the feelings and respect that come with building wealth through hard work will always reign supreme.
