54: Fairness

Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.

Well hello, everyone. welcome to episode 54. So, I live in New Jersey, just outside of New York City. And we’ve had several days in a row where the weather has been creeping up around 60 degrees. And something just changes around here.

Now, I lived in New York City for a long time, but I’m pretty much right across the river now. And so, it’s hard to explain. I guess you could say spring is in the air.

And I’m sort of laughing inside because a year ago, we spent the winter in Hawaii. And any time the weather got below 75, I want to say, we were cold. And so, it’s just so interesting what we get used to.

And so, of course, today the weather was more like 35 or 40 degrees this morning. And I often sort of lament that March in the Northeast is cool. Because you’ll have a few days where it’s warm and sunny and gorgeous and you want to play outside. And then it gets cold again and then you’re reminded that spring isn’t quite here. Anyway, that was kind of random. But that’s just what I was thinking about today.

So, today I want to talk about the topic of fairness. This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while and it was sort of spurred by one of my previous one-on-one clients, and some other clients that I’ve had, where the issue of getting what’s fair comes up a lot.

And so, most of these clients were quote unquote suffering because they wanted what was fair for them. And for one of these clients, it was in the context of a divorce. And so, it really got me thinking, what does fair even mean? And is fair something we should even strive for or want?

And I’ve come to the conclusion that the answer is no in almost all cases. So, that’s what I want to talk about today. Because how many of us think that life should be fair? Or we should get our fair share of things, especially money?

We often hear people say the rich need to pay their fair share of taxes. So, today, I want to unpack this whole fair business because I want to submit that this, this fair thing, is a terrible goal.

So, let’s first define fair. So, this is what Google told me. Fair is an adjective. And it means free from bias, dishonesty, or injustice. The second definition is what I’m working with though. The second definition, meaning legitimately sought, pursued, done, given, et cetera, proper under the rules. And the example they gave was a fair fight.

So, I’ve come up with sort of two reasons why I think fair is a terrible goal. Number one, when you’re focused on getting what’s fair, it removes the focus from your own inner power. Meaning it leaves the power to someone else or something else. Meaning that something outside of us has the ability to make us happy, or whatever you think having things fair would do for you.

I think this whole idea of fair is we think life would be better if things were fair. And ultimately, we would be happier.

And here’s the second reason. I think it makes us feel terrible when we think things should be fair. Because, well, go to number one, Meaning that we think life will be better if things were fair. And since things aren’t fair, we feel terrible. So, it kind of goes in this loop, as you can see.

So, I think all of us should drop this fair thing as the goal or the standard. Because like I said, in my experience, from what I’ve observed in coaching many clients, it almost always leaves us feeling terrible. Focus on you, what you can control. And we can never control other people, no matter how hard we try.

Now, I’m not saying that you should accept anything either. But I think we really need to question why things should be fair. And when you’re striving for things being fair or getting your fair share, whatever fair you’re going for, is that type of thinking serving you?

Is it actually helping you to think that way or is it causing a lot of negative emotions and angst? That is the difference, I think, of when fair is serving you or not serving you.

Personally, I don’t think it’s ever served me to think that things should be fair for me, or whatever. I just kind of assume that things won’t be fair, or that life won’t be fair.

It doesn’t mean I just sit there complacent or not do anything about things. But I just don’t believe that that’s the goal. And I recommend you do the same.

What would you spend your time thinking on instead if you stopped believing things should be fair? What would be a better use of your time if you stopped thinking that things should be fair? What would you be working on instead? What would you be creating instead?

So, I hope I’ve given you some things to ponder on and I’ll see you guys next week.

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