Greedy man. Greed caused by fears and fears

Greed is a common character quality, the nature of which is still not clear, and psychologists and psychotherapists still debate its causes.

Greed refers to excessive stinginess or a person’s inability to perform selfless acts. This character quality is also known under other names - greed, stinginess, third

To simplify, we can say that at the everyday level, being greedy is terrible. Why? Our article will answer this question.

Where does greed come from? Types of Greed

Psychologists have found that greed has its origins in early childhood. The more parents limit their child, the higher the likelihood of developing a tight-fisted character. For example, you do not listen to your child’s wishes or constantly force him to endure. The child absorbs this pattern of behavior and will copy it in the future.

There are two types of greed: healthy and unhealthy. Healthy greed refers to reasonable savings caused by a person’s modest income. The second type is unhealthy or hypertrophied greed. A person infected with the spiritual virus of greed is unhappy and looks comical from the outside. It’s funny to look at a wealthy individual who is constantly looking for benefits and is afraid to spend an extra penny.

Greed is a symbiosis of stinginess and greed

Defining the third vice is not so easy. We can say that a greedy person is one in whom greed and stinginess coexist. The first is understood as a desire to constantly increase one’s benefits, while the second, on the contrary, is a painful attitude towards spending. It turns out that being greedy is terrible; a person not only strives for profit, but is also afraid to spend an extra penny.

Continuing the theme of stinginess, we can say that this concept is close in meaning to prudence and stinginess. They are not yet greed, but can turn into it if the desire not to spend money becomes obsessive.

However, an intelligent person is able to see the dangerous line and realize that it is time to think about his attitude towards material wealth.

Being greedy is terrible. Why?

In our capitalist era, it is difficult to find a person who is not prone to greed. Especially when success is equated with material wealth. Of course, the desire to have enough money for a decent standard of living is normal.

But being greedy is terrible. "Why?" - the reader will ask. Yes, because this quality of character does not allow a person; it squeezes the soul, like a boa constrictor, and prevents him from breathing freely.

• Constant savings on yourself. A stingy person counts every penny; he cannot relax and at least sometimes not think about how much he spent.
• Greed always breeds wealthier people. He does not feel sincere joy for his friend - in his heart he envies him.
• Self-interest. A greedy person comes from personal gain: he is incapable of doing good deeds just like that, without expecting anything in return.

To summarize, we can say that being greedy is terrible, because a stingy person does not bring happiness to himself or other people.

How to overcome greed?

Make sure you truly understand that being greedy is terrible. Anyone can write an essay on this topic if they think carefully. For some, it will allow them to see themselves from the outside and laugh heartily, and perhaps reconsider their value system.

Simple rules will help you become a more harmonious person and get rid of greed:

• Do good deeds for nothing, without expecting anything in return.
• Learn to sincerely enjoy the successes of other people.
• Help your friends if you have the opportunity.
• Enjoy life without thinking about finances, at least during your vacation.
• Thank people both for their good attitude towards you and for small surprises.
• Develop self-irony.
• Remember that happiness is not measured by money, happiness is

Money plays an important role in the life of our modern day. They are a tool with the help of which a person is free to perform certain actions. Feel free to do something nice for your friends and family. A generous person is, by definition, happy, and it has long been proven that the giver always gets double back.

Always remember that being greedy is terrible. Why, you know.

From early childhood, a child experiences first-hand the entire range of emotions inherent in an adult. This includes envy, when you want the same toy as the neighbor’s kid, and rage, when you fall and get hurt, and curiosity, and love... Kids feel their feelings in their pure form, they still do not know evil intent. For example, even if he is greedy and does not want to share what he has, a child will never behave like a stingy person.

"Stingy" does not mean "greedy". This is a much more hypertrophied and harmful quality for the human soul, when calculation is connected to simple greed. In this article we will look at what it means to be stingy, whether it is possible to get away from your own stinginess and whether there is at least something useful in this trait.

Meaning of the word "stingy"

If you choose a definition for the word you are looking for, then the closest in terms of conveying qualities will be the statements “greedy for frugality”, “one who avoids spending”. “Stingy”, “miser”, “miser” - these are the names of a stingy person. In fact, stinginess and greed are close in meaning, but not in meaning. If a greedy person simply does not want to share anything with others, but he himself rejoices in his acquisitions, then someone who is stingy perceives material wealth in a completely different way. A stingy person does not want to spend money at all - neither on himself nor on others.

He looks like a beggar in appearance, lives in Spartan conditions, while under his sofa there may be chests of gold. Stingy people often become rich, because they know the value of every penny and spend money exclusively for its intended purpose.

Stinginess is not stupidity

Paradoxical as it may seem, not everyone considers stinginess a bad quality. Studying the work of A. N. Ostrovsky, in particular, the work “Forest”, you can find the following quote: “I don’t know, I’m still young, sir; and smart people say that stinginess is not stupidity.” Maybe this quality isn't so bad? And in fact, how does a stingy person differ from ordinary people?

A stingy person is someone who is extremely frugal. He doesn't want to spend and spend what he has. He keeps, accumulates and multiplies all the savings that he has.

A stingy person is a poor person

What is curious is that the material benefits that he and others have are of no use. As Deon Say said, while a frugal person does not want to waste anything, a frugal person does not want to spend anything at all. He won’t buy himself a luxury apartment, a luxury car, won’t go on a trip, won’t give anything to the woman he loves. Every penny is so significant to a stingy person that he is ready to wear shabby clothes and eat crackers just to avoid spending any of his savings. In fact, it turns out that a stingy person, judging by how he lives and what he has, is more likely to be poor than rich. Stinginess is complete helplessness in front of money, when gold and banknotes control a person and his behavior.

How to get rid of stinginess

Can someone who is stingy somehow become free from the power of money? A stingy person is a slave to material things. By and large, excessive wastefulness and stinginess are simply two sides of the same coin. Both those and other people are not free, they are under the power of money.

From a psychological point of view, it doesn’t matter what you depend on: cigarettes, drugs or money - any addiction makes a person weak and weak-willed. How to get rid of stinginess, if possible? It is believed that the best way is to start spending. For a stingy person, all expenses look like a tragedy, but this is the best cure for psychological illness. Having managed to accept the fact that by wasting what he has acquired, he loses nothing, the miser will feel relief. If such a person sees that money can be exchanged for something valuable and useful, he will be able to escape the harmful influence of material things.

Man's greed is insatiable. It has no end. A person becomes attached to his money. All his thoughts are constantly focused on the safe with money and a bunch of keys to it. Money for him is his blood and the only meaning of life.

Sometimes people are surprised by the changes happening to their loved ones. He was a normal person, but now he started dragging old trash into the house. You can't persuade a burnt out light bulb to be thrown away.

His mezzanines are filled with things that have long since expired; he is very upset when he loses a few rubles; it is difficult to persuade him to spend any amount to please himself or his loved ones. This quality is popularly called greed.

Since ancient times, greed has been considered a human vice, so few people admit to such a shortcoming. A negative attitude towards this property is reflected in all world religions.

In this article we will try to figure out who has this feeling and for what reason. Let's try to understand where this desire for hoarding and reluctance to spend money even on necessary things came from.

What is greed?

Explanatory dictionaries define greed as stinginess, selfishness, acquisitiveness, avarice, the desire to get as much as possible, to have much more than is necessary. As you can see, this collective concept consists of several components.

Greed is the inability to let go of anything from oneself, it is a state of disharmony, dissatisfaction and condemnation of any manifestations of generosity. Constant internal dissonance creates in such a person a fear of life and a desire to have more and more in order to ensure psychological safety. He perceives life as something hostile, because it can burst in, open windows, doors and take everything away.

Money is the biggest accumulator of human greed (Mavrodiy Sergey Panteleevich)

There are many cases where people who own a large bank account live in an apartment that has not been renovated for several decades, and even with the heating turned off in order to save money. This is, of course, an extreme expression of greed. But it also occurs quite often.

Greedy people in everyday life

It is difficult to live with a greedy person. He constantly pesters his household with comments about light bulbs not being turned off and taps not being properly closed, because these are unnecessary expenses. It forces you to save on everything, even on groceries.

He doesn’t allow anything to be thrown away, and the house ends up filled with old household appliances, completely unnecessary things, and out-of-fashion clothes. He adds something he found somewhere to his junk, explaining that it will come in handy someday.

If he finds a ruble on the street, he feels happy. This is a replacement for real happiness, which comes from realizing oneself in society. Unfortunately, in our country, people who have finished their working career are confined to their own small interests. At best, they are busy raising their grandchildren or working on their summer cottages.

These people have at least some kind of realization and therefore remain normal. Those who are deprived of even this have deficiencies that are manifested by changes in personality traits that are not for the better.

As a result, such people's relationships with loved ones deteriorate, who are forced to endure their quirks and the inconveniences they cause. They become uninteresting to others, because their interest has shrunk to one thing: “Neither spend nor miss.”

It should be noted that this does not happen to everyone. Only people with the skin vector “get sick” from greed. This is the other side of people who, by their nature, are earners, organizers, legislators, inventors, engineers, businessmen, that is, all those who make our lives comfortable and allow us to satisfy almost any need.

This is how they become in a developed and realized state. If the most developed skin person is deprived of the opportunity to realize his properties or he falls into stress, then we will get its opposite. Thus, under the influence of severe stress, he may even begin to steal for a while or become a spendthrift and begin shopping aimlessly.

Spiritual Consequences of Human Greed

This passion for acquisitiveness is an extremely significant obstacle to spiritual improvement, since it is the main catalyst for the creation of negative karma.

Christ said that a camel would rather go through the eye of a needle than a rich man would enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Constant concern for earthly goods distracts attention from higher aspirations, weakens sublime inclinations, corrupts a person and makes him a slave of circumstances. That is why people who sought to understand higher plans preached renunciation of material wealth.

Greed often hides a thirst for leadership. People of the pedantic type are very prone to hoarding. A pedant can become a miser or a rationally frugal person. Often people of this type are passionate collectors: as children they collect stickers and stamps (and their albums are very neatly decorated), and as adults they can collect anything within their capabilities.

Human greed is often generated by a lack of love and warmth in childhood. However, it can also be a karmic illness brought from past lives. You can get rid of greed only when a person changes the entire value system and begins to build relationships within the family and society in a new way.

Today, the line between the concepts of thrift and greed has become almost transparent, because most people are accustomed to living from paycheck to paycheck and denying themselves in many ways, not to mention others. However, there are also quite wealthy people who are afraid to spend an extra penny. This means that they do not give expensive gifts to friends, do not take their relatives to a restaurant and do not buy luxury perfumes, despite their wealth. But at the same time, curmudgeons can be polite, well-mannered and friendly in all non-material aspects.

According to American scientists, greed is a kind of engine of progress; without it, people would learn to be content with little and would stop developing.

How to deal with greedy people?

Why do they become greedy?

Chinese philosophy says that greedy people are deeply unhappy, because they cannot be satisfied with what they have right now, they are always tormented by groundless vanity.

How to get rid of greed?

Natalya Kaptsova

Reading time: 6 minutes

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Who are these greedy people? These are very boring and petty comrades with an obsession with “accumulating.” And it doesn’t matter if the stingy guy is an unfamiliar gentleman with whom you “can’t baptize your children.”

But what if this miser is your friend? What to do? Forgive, understand and accept? Or urgently delete his number from your phone and forget it like a bad dream?

Greedy people - what they are: distinctive signs of a greedy person

As you know, greed is one of the vices condemned by most world religions. And it’s a rare person who admits it.

Greedy tries to take everything from life. But, alas, he does not receive satisfaction due to his insatiability.

What kind of greedy guy is he? What are the symptoms of the “disease”?

• He does not lend (or gives with demonstrative reluctance).
• He eats the last piece of “sweet” with a light heart.
• His wardrobe contains branded items, but at home he will wear just anything. When meeting guests (which rarely happens) in an expensive shirt, he will not be ashamed to brew one tea bag in a friend’s cup for the second time.
• He never throws away “old junk” like an ancient refrigerator or grandma’s chandelier. Hoarding is in his blood.
• He always bargains in markets and even in shops, never leaves tips and very carefully counts the change.
• He is extremely jealous. The second half, in his opinion, is also his property.
• Everyone around him is his potential rivals and competitors.
• He always feels for more successful people.
• He loves shopping.
• He takes care of his car, but saves on gas and travels more often by bus.
• When presenting a gift, he will definitely notice that it cost him a lot, or he will simply leave the price tag in a visible place. However, waiting for a gift from him is a real miracle.
• When paying for goods, there is universal sorrow on his face, as if he were giving away his last.
• He is constantly looking for ways to save money.
• He will definitely time the wedding date to coincide with some holiday in order to save on gifts for his wife. Which, by the way, will give them according to her taste (so that “everyone will find it useful”).
• Searching for discounts and sales is his favorite pastime. Even if he urgently needs a TV, he will wait until there is a promotion somewhere for this equipment. He makes most of his purchases in the first days of January, when stores massively lower prices for city residents who are temporarily “impoverished” after the holidays.
• As soon as you leave the room for a couple of minutes, he is already flying there to turn off the light. And you can completely forget about “taking a bath.” Just a shower, and quickly like an army! Counters after all!
• He is always unsatisfied with his life.

“He was a great housekeeper!”

It is important to distinguish greed from the usual desire to save due to life circumstances (or character).

Thrifty Friend He will also look for sales and maybe even make tea a second time, but he will never leave a friend without a gift for the holiday, and the gift itself - with a price tag.

When communicating with a frugal friend, you don't experience negative emotions , and it doesn’t involuntarily roll off your tongue - “miserly!” On the contrary, you admire his ability to allocate money and save even where this is usually impossible.

Stingy or stingy?

It is worth noting that these two concepts are also different. A stingy person saves on everything, including food. He will travel across the city to buy a kilo of fish for 10 rubles cheaper, and will look for a new “mobile phone” via the Internet, because the price is always lower there.

But he will not skimp on gifts for a friend or beloved woman , and will never “excuse myself” with a box of chocolates for my birthday. At general friendly meetings, he will always contribute his share for the “banquet” and will not try to enter heaven on someone else’s hump.

His stinginess only applies to him . Greed spreads to everyone around.

Reasons for the greed of friends and acquaintances - why are people greedy?

As a rule, We don’t become greedy suddenly, but gradually . Moreover, starting from early childhood. It is rare for a person to become greedy at a conscious adult age (the habits are too strong).

As for the reasons for greed, there are not so many of them:

• Self-doubt and obsessive desire for physical/psychological safety. Constant fears of life push the greedy person to accumulate. Life for him is hostile and dangerous, so he must prepare for difficulties “today and now.”
• An example from childhood. The childhood model of the family, as a rule, is automatically transferred to the adult lives of children. If dad or mom were greedy, the child does not consider greed unnatural.
• Mom and dad did not teach the child to be generous and simply did not notice how he turned into a greedy person. This usually happens after the birth of the second baby in the family. The eldest child, left “on the sidelines of life,” takes matters into his own hands - the lack of attention, toys and love raises in him a person who begins to live for himself, in his own shell.
• He grew up in a rich family. And from the cradle, mom and dad threw all their “riches” at his feet. He is not used to sharing, giving, giving. He is used to only taking and demanding. And even his first word was “give!”
• He made his fortune with “sweat and blood” , and sees a threat in everything that concerns his money.
• Poverty in the past. Such life stages, when you have to save every penny, also do not pass without a trace. Some acquire the habit of living frugally and within their means, while for others, saving develops into greed and pettiness out of fear that “one day everything will collapse again.”
• He simply lives with plans for the future. An obsessive dream (or a clear goal) of a car (apartment, cottage, travel, etc.) is more important than all his needs and the needs of his relatives and friends. The goal obscures a person’s eyes, and everything except it becomes unimportant and empty.

How to deal with a greedy friend - understand, accept and forgive?

According to Chinese (and indeed any other) philosophy, greedy is always unhappy . Simply because he is unable to be satisfied with today and is always tormented by groundless vanity.

But the main question for the greedy friends remains - what to do? Should I completely sever the relationship so as not to feel constant resentment towards my fellow miser, come to terms and accept my friend as he is, or try to re-educate him?

Certainly, if the relationship is an unbearable burden , which you want to get rid of, then there is no point in such a relationship, and you need to leave.

But still, even a greedy person is capable of being responsive, interesting and loyal. Greed is not a sentence , and it is quite possible to cure it (or at least “relieve the aggravation”) with cunning, as well as understanding and love.

How to do this?

• Be an example for your friend. Give him gifts, treat him to dinner, and do not skimp on kind deeds and words.
• Treat your friend's greed with a smile and humor. Let him understand that you notice his greed, and you don’t like it, but you are not going to give up your friend.
• It makes sense to teach your friend “lessons of greed” from time to time, mirroring his attitude towards you. Again, without anger or moralizing. Let him feel how insulting it is to be the friend of a greedy person.

And most importantly, be magnanimous, merciful and generous yourself . It is impossible to remain greedy when you are surrounded by kind and bright people, whose words and actions come from the heart.

Have you ever had greedy friends in your life? And how did you build relationships with them? Share your stories in the comments below!