Poverty, a Mental Disability

Poverty, a Mental Disability

Poverty is a multidimensional phenomenon, encompassing inability to satisfy the basic needs, lack of control over resources, lack of education and poor health. It is the greatest cause of suffering on earth that is intrinsically alienating and distressing. Any person living in poor conditions is more stressed, constantly worrying about means to meet his daily expenditures, bills to be paid and fees of children etc. Most of the times it becomes very difficult for him to even meet his daily expenditures. It is a well understood and recognized fact that living in poverty for a significant length has negative implications on both his physical as well as mental health.

Those who live in underprivileged societies, where there is under-investment in the social and physical infrastructure, experience poor health and hygienic conditions. Poverty is associated with many long-term problems, such as poor health and increased mortality, school failure, crime and substance misuse. The effects of income inequality also spills over into society giving it the biggest reason for causing stress, frustration and family disruption that increases the rate of crimes besides homicide and violence in the society due to which the gap between the poor and rich in the world is widening each day.

As poverty and social inequality are closely linked with each other, they therefore have direct impact on the social, mental and physical well-being of any individual living under such circumstances. There are several obstacles and threats to health that inherent in poverty as it is the poor who are exposed to dangerous unhygienic environmental conditions, stressful, unrewarding and depersonalizing work that lacks the necessities and amenities of life, which looks as if they are not part of the mainstream of society and are totally isolated and cut off.

Poverty is strongly associated with a discrepancy in children’s upbringing, cognitive skills, educational achievements and disruptive behaviours too. Children belonging to such families face persistent economic stress and are more likely to have mental disabilities due to starvation and malnutrition. 

No doubt poverty is a disgraceful and unjust condition that has always haunted mankind and many people see this problem as insoluble as they claim that assisting the poor increases dependency that enhances  a “culture of poverty” which persists from generation to generation. Some people even go further to blame the poor for their problems as according to them many of the poor are shiftless, lazy, unintelligent, or even parasitic.

The trouble with many of poverty victims today is that they are not confident of themselves and have accepted their life as it is. They blame their fate for their continuous slogging conditions. Even on hearing the news of corruption by the rich wealthy people reach their ears, they tend to lose confidence in their ability to cope with such problematic conditions and are disheartened. When an individual loses confidence, his enthusiasm is killed and life becomes a grind and aimless, hence they are incapable of conquering poverty. Those who face it and fight for their upliftment definitely succeed giving a positive vision not only to their entire family but also to their relatives and friends. 

We should not overlook the heartless, grasping practices of those rich people or the unfair, cruel conditions brought about by unscrupulous political and financial schemers; for it is the right of a common man that they should be aware of such deeds and unite together to fight for their rights. It’s not a sin to be poor. 

We blame them for not working, being lazy, having drug addictions, making poor choices, and not trying hard enough. We often equate financial worth with personal values and we place the poor in the lowest system of our preconceived human caste systems. We treat them accordingly and are continually blaming, humiliating and shaming them through our condescending criticism, “instruction,” and judgment etc.

But have we ever thought that who are we to judge the poor? God never intended that any man should be a pauper, a drudge, or a slave. There is not a single indication in God’s wonderful mechanism that a man was created to live a poor life. It is God, Our Creator, who has differentiated each individual. We could have also been born in a poor family too. We should all understand one concept that everyone is a wonderful creation of God where we all are one family and to help each other should always be our motto. There is something larger and grander for him in his plans than perpetual slavery to the bread earning problems.

Because being poor is not a life-long condition and one has to work harder to recover from this mental illness which should be a collective goal on top priority for all of us. If every rich and the wealthy person opts to undertake the responsibility to help the poor and needy, this world itself shall be a heaven on earth. We should also keep it in mind that the rich owe to the poor. How? And Why? They owe it because they are better off than others. It is the hard work of the poor that yields positive results that work their way to the top. By helping them, they seem to be giving back to society. This is a noble deed that should be done with a good spirit on humanitarian grounds and not because of want of tax exemptions at the end of their financial year.

The worst thing about poverty is the conviction that the poor hold no position in life is indeed very fatal to the competence. No doubt it is tough to see the poor struggling to keep the wolf at bay and they cannot be independent, nor can they organise their lives. They cannot even come up with a courage to express their opinions in public or have an individual view. They cannot even dream of being able to live in decent locations or in healthy hygienic conditions. When worries embrace and one is entangled with debts, it is difficult for any average human being to be a real individual and it is almost impossible to preserve that dignity and self-respect which enables a man to hold up his head and look the world squarely on the face. Some rare and beautiful souls have lived in dire poverty, setting an example of noble living to the world. If not accepted, then poverty often develops the worst in any man and kills the feeling of love, affection, emotion, caring and belongingness, leaving strong pinching marks of insufficiency all around. It is then easily noticeable in prematurely old, depressed faces and in children who have had no childhood and who have borne the mark of the poverty-curse ever since their birth. We see it shadowing bright young faces, and often blighting the highest ambition and dwarfing the most brilliant ability.

It is a bitter truth that poverty is more often a curse than a blessing and those who praise its virtues would be the last to accept its hard conditions. What is most deplorable is preventable poverty which is due to vicious living, to slovenly, slipshod, to idling and dawdling, or to laziness; that poverty which is due to the lack of effort, to wrong thinking, or to any preventable cause. Such people should be ashamed of poverty because this can be prevented for also gives a negative reflection upon their ability that make others think low of them. 

Any individual who persists in holding his mental attitude toward poverty, or who is always thinking of their hard luck and failure to get on, can by no means go into the opposite direction where the goal of success is awaiting. Such an attitude shall never arrive at the harbour of delight.

Stingy, narrow minds do not attract money. If they get money they usually get it by parsimonious saving, rather than by obeying the law of opulence. It takes a broad, liberal mind to attract money. The narrow, stingy mind shuts out the flow of abundance. It is the hopeful, buoyant, cheerful attitude of mind that wins because if optimism is a success-builder, then pessimism is an achievement-killer. Optimism is the great producer. It is hope, life. It contains everything which enters into the mental attitude which produces and enjoys. Pessimism is the great destroyer. It is despair, death. No matter if you have lost your property, your health, your reputation even, there is always hope for the man who keeps a firm faith in himself and looks up.

To get rid of the poverty, it is of utmost importance to keep the mind in a productive, creative condition that always think positively, confidently, cheerfully and creatively. If an individual wants to become prosperous, they must believe that they are made for success and happiness; that there is a divinity in them which will, if they follow it, bring them into the light of prosperity. Erase all the shadows, all the doubts and fears, and the suggestions of poverty and failure from your mind. When you have become master of your thought, when you have once learned to dominate your mind, you will find that things will begin to come your way. Discouragement, fear, doubt, lack of self-confidence, are the germs which have killed the prosperity and happiness of tens of thousands of people.

If it were possible for all the poor to turn their backs on their dark and discouraging environment and face the light and cheer, and if they should resolve that they are done with poverty and a slipshod existence, this very resolution would, in a short time, revolutionize civilization. Every child should be taught to expect prosperity, to believe that the good things of the world were intended for them. This conviction would be a powerful factor in the adult life if the child were so trained.

Wealth is created mentally first; it is thought out before it becomes a reality.

Firmly deny the power of adversity or poverty that keeps you down. Constantly assert your superiority to your environment. Believe that you are to dominate your surroundings, that you are the master and not the slave of circumstances. 

Determination with all the vitality one can gather that you are going to have your share without harming anybody else or keeping others back as it is intended that you have a competence in abundance and it that you should resolve to reach your divine destiny.

The very act of turning your back upon the black picture and resolving that you will have nothing more to do with failure, with poverty; that you will make the best possible out of what you do have; that you will put up the best possible appearance; that you will clean up, brush up, talk up, look up, instead of down — hold your head up and look the world in the faces instead of cringing, whining, complaining — will create a new spirit within you which will lead you to the light. Hope will take the place of despair, and you will feel the thrill of a new power, of a new force coursing through your veins.

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