Money makes the world go round, but why is it that money can’t buy love? “Money makes the world go round,” is a familiar saying that we often hear. It means that if you have money; you can have anything you want in the world. Well, almost everything because we know that there are some things money can’t buy.
Memories
We know that money can buy a lot of material things. There are many material things that can make us feel happy. The act of giving and receiving gifts is one of them. Being able to acquire material possessions that let us live comfortably also makes us feel happy. Having limited edition items around us can also make us feel wealthy and even proud of ourselves.
A house and lot or an apartment unit, nice furniture and appliances, the latest gadgets, a car, and being able to spend for a vacation are things we want and need. Cooking a meal or making DIY gifts for our loved ones are priceless memories to us. All these material possessions require money to buy and maintain. The memories that we create with these things around us, can never be bought with money.
Relationships
One of the things that money can’t buy is genuine relationships. You can’t buy yourself a family who will love and support you. You can’t buy yourself friends. Your buddies and you have stuck together over the years because of your appreciation and acceptance of each other. This means that you all enjoyed the good times together but you still stuck with each other during the bad times.
Relationships are built through time and effort, respect and understanding, and constant communication. It will take money to go out for dinner and road trips with your friends. But you can’t buy respect, acceptance, understanding and the appreciation you get from those who have learned to value you for who you are.
Experiences
You can buy a good bed and mattress; but you can’t buy a good night’s sleep. You can enroll in a class, get a coach or mentor, buy a book or listen to audiobooks to learn from people’s experiences. These kinds of learning materials can be bought with money. However, most of us never really learn valuable life lessons unless we get to experience them ourselves. Even in travel adventures; we always long to go to the travel destinations ourselves instead of just admiring them in pictures.
Through personal experiences, we are able to learn how to face our fears, overcome challenges, process our hurts and move on from grief. We also learn how to transform ourselves and our mindsets to become better people. Each person has their own path in life. Money can’t buy you the courage and belief in yourself that you need to move forward in your journey.
Love
All our memories, relationships and experiences are precious to us because of the feelings we had during those events and with those people. Happy or sad, peaceful or confused, angry or joyful, are emotions we associate with many of our memories, experiences and the people in our life. Most of the things we consider beautiful don’t need to be bought. Falling in love is one of the riskiest things we can be involved in. Yet, we dive into it willingly even if the chance of getting hurt is always there.
If we think about it carefully, we can simplify things by looking at emotions as stemming from love or the lack of it. We feel loved by the people around us, or by the Universe, that’s why we feel happy, joyful and even peaceful. On the other hand, we feel unloved when people ignore us, reject us, or don’t want to be around us. Our environment feels sad and gloomy and not like a safe space at all when we are not surrounded by the things we love. Just think how giving someone a plushie has become a universally accepted token of friendship and love.
Money Can’t Buy Love
There is no love bank anywhere in the world. We cannot deposit or withdraw love as we do with money. It is not possible to purchase love directly from any store either. But we can purchase things for other people to show them we love them whatever their love language may be.
Fortunately, no love bank is needed. We can generate love on our own. If you want to increase love in your life; just do things that make you feel loved or show others your love for them. When you experience a decrease in love or a lack of it; then do the things you need to do to increase feelings of love in your life again.
During negative situations, take a breather and try to see the bright side of things. Ask yourself: Where can love be shown and increased in this situation or with this person’s circumstances? Being positive does not solve all situations. After all, we are human. It is perfectly okay to not be okay and walk away to heal ourselves first by loving ourselves.
There may also be times when we need to walk away from a person we truly love and let them go. We often call this “hard love” because it is indeed very hard to do. Our tendency is to cling on for fear of losing that person’s love for us. We do not lose love in such situations. Love is energy and it does not disappear. It only transforms into something else. All the love we give eventually comes back to us; sometimes in even more wonderful ways. Now that is the kind of interest rate that no amount of money saved up or invested can match or guarantee. That is why, money can’t buy love.
Feature Image: Original Photo by Laura Ockel on Unsplash.