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Alan Cohen’s Secrets

By Philippe Matthews
 (© all rights reserved, www.empowermag.com)

PM: Lesson four: Crooked Beans, you say, “Money is important but a wealth mentality is essential.”

AC: “We have been taught that wealth equals a certain amount of money in the bank; usually ten percent more than what you really have (laughter)! But wealth is an attitude and I teach a couple of prosperity courses online and the first lesson for each of them is that money is really a very small slice of the pie of wealth. There are so many different aspects of wealth that go far beyond money and its all how you look at it. You can be wealthy in relationships, wealthy in health, wealthy in friendship, wealthy in spirit, wealthy in nature around you and beauty so there’s wealth all around us. But you experience only as much wealth as you see. So if the eye that you’re looking at the universe with is jaundice, everything is going to be yellow. I was just watching Wayne Dyer’s special on TV the other night and he kept repeating this phrase ‘when you change the way you look at things the things you look at will change.’ Developing a wealth mentality is reconfiguring the vision you are using.”

PM: You say in the book, “You can get over being poor, but it takes longer to get over being ignorant.” Wow!

AC: “That’s a double barreled shotgun right there! I think the best example of that are lottery winners. They have done tremendous psychological studies of lottery winners and they find that a lot of them get more unhappy the more they have. They start fighting with their siblings, they have to hire bodyguards for their children and some of them have become alcoholics and committed suicide, believe or not. Most of them have reverted to their previous level of wealth within five to ten years of winning the lottery which says that having money is good but having a consciousness to hold it is even more important.”

PM: In lesson five: Borrowed Photos, you say, “I inherited my beliefs about money from my parents and other authority figures.” Do we spend most of our lives trying to undo the memories our parents instilled in us?

AC: “It’s worse than that. Most people don’t even get to the point where they are trying to undo them. Most people just keep living them out. A small percentage of people on the planet get the idea that the patterns they are living out aren’t their own beliefs and we are consciously seeking to undo them. I think once you get a hold of some spiritual tools, you will start having some success. Higher power, bigger consciousness and open heart are all keys that give you leverage to move beyond the old.”

PM: In the eighth lesson of Mr. Everit’s Secret you say, “Money is a current of energy that becomes good or evil depending on how you think of it and use it.” So the old quote that money is the root of all evil is just not so?

AC: “You might say that attachment to money is the root of all evil or giving your power away to money is the root of all evil or believing that money is the answer is the root of all evil. These are the things that get people into trouble. To break that myth, if you can identify one person you know who has money, enjoys it and uses it for good, has fun with it and helps other people, you have just broken that myth. Malcolm Forbes was known as the happy millionaire because he was always throwing big parties and when he died he left the employees money, he forgave all of his personal debts and he used money as a tool for turning people on.”

PM: You continue on with this philosophy further in lesson eight when you say, “If people knew their power to generate wealth, they would not need to force or withhold it from others.”

AC: “That is so key. I’m glad you brought that up. I really put a lot of thought into this book and tried to hone it down to its most pungent statements and that was one of them. When you think of things that you hassle with people over money about it’s always because you don’t think you have enough. If you think, ‘well, if I can just get it from them,’ or ‘if they leave me or fire me, I’m going to be in trouble,’ or ‘I am going to punish them by withholding money from them;’ you are working on a false premise. The premise is that you need a company or someone else for your wealth. If the company lays you off or fires you and you go into depression, it’s because you think you’re screwed now. It’s a misunderstanding and mistaken assumption. The truth is that each of us has the power to generate immense and infinite wealth when connected to our Source. Our Source is not a person; our Source is Spirit, the Universe, God, and Truth – whatever you want to call it. We each have a direct relationship with Spirit and don’t need to go to another person to get the Spirit. They were just a momentary connection; they weren’t the answer or the Source, same thing with money.”


Alan Cohen is the author of 21 inspirational books and tapes, including the best-selling book, Why Your Life Sucks, The Dragon Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, the award-winning, A Deep Breath of Life. He is a contributing writer for the New York Times best selling series, Chicken Soup for the Soul. Alan’s monthly syndicated column, From The Heart, appears internationally in 50 magazines including Empower Mag.com. He is a frequent guest on national radio and television, and his presentations are regularly broadcast via satellite on the Wisdom Channel.

Alan Cohen is the author of the best-selling, The Dragon Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, the award-winning, A Deep Breath of Life, and the acclaimed, Why Your Life Sucks and What You Can Do About It. This August join Alan in Maui for his life-transforming Mastery Training. For information on this seminar and a free catalog of Alan’s books, tapes, and seminars, phone 1-800-568-3079, visit www.alancohen.com, email admin@alancohen.com , or write P.O. Box 835, Haiku, HI 96708.