There’s a piece of land in the city where LoriAnn and I raised our family. Years ago, right out of dental school, someone offered us the chance to buy acreage on the bench. Sixteen thousand dollars an acre.

We passed without much discussion. We had no real income, I was just getting started, and honestly the whole idea felt like someone was speaking a foreign language to us. We could have borrowed a little money and figured it out. We just never let ourselves think that far.

Those acres have since been divided into building lots. Each quarter to half-acre lot now sells somewhere between $250,000 and $350,000 and the homes they are building are in the $1,000,000 to $10,000,000 range.

I’ll give you a moment to do that math. It still stings a little.

That story isn’t about a missed investment. It’s about what happens when scarcity is running the show.

LoriAnn and I were listening to a webinar this morning from Peter Sage, and the topic was abundance. Something he said stopped me cold. The idea that money itself isn’t scarce. There is an enormous amount of money in the world. It moves constantly. What creates the feeling that there isn’t enough isn’t the supply. It’s our relationship with it.

I’ve spent a fair amount of my life on the wrong side of that equation. Running a dental practice for 37 years meant watching overhead, managing payroll, and stressing over insurance write-offs. Being careful with money is smart. But somewhere along the way, careful started sliding into afraid, and I didn’t even notice when it happened.

Scarcity thinking is sneaky that way. It doesn’t knock on the door and introduce itself. It just quietly starts making your decisions for you.

A Word About Money and Faith

A lot of us grew up hearing that money is the root of all evil. I heard it too. And if you internalize that long enough, wanting financial security starts to feel spiritually suspicious, like maybe good people shouldn’t want too much.

Here’s the thing though. That’s not what the scripture actually says. The verse is that the love of money is the root of all evil. Not money itself.

That’s a significant difference. Money is a tool. It’s neutral. What corrupts isn’t having it. It’s when chasing it becomes the most important thing, when it’s what you’d compromise your integrity for, when it crowds out everything else that actually matters.

Once I finally separated those two ideas, something in me settled down. Wanting to provide well for your family isn’t greed. Building income that outlasts your working years isn’t materialism. It’s stewardship. Wanting more access to helping others is not evil. And once you see it that way, a lot of the guilt around wanting financial abundance just disappears.

Abundance Is Bigger Than Your Bank Account

Here’s what retirement has taught me that I wish I had understood 30 years ago. Abundance isn’t a number. It’s a way of seeing.

And here’s the good news. You don’t have to start with money.

If your finances are tighter than you’d like right now, I get it. That’s real. But abundance doesn’t require you to begin there. Start with your health if you have it, because that is a genuine gift that not everyone gets to keep. Start with your family, your friendships, the people who have been in your corner through all of it. Start with a sunny morning, a good cup of coffee or hot chocolate, the fact that you woke up with your mind clear and the day still open.

I live near the Gulf Coast now. There are mornings I walk outside and think, nobody is paying me to experience this. It’s just here. That is abundance.

Gratitude for what’s already overflowing has a way of training your brain to see more of it. And that shift opens doors that fear kept locked.

One Practical Move Worth Making

One of the best financial decisions you can make, whether retirement is five years out or already here, is to start building assets that generate passive income. Income that arrives whether you worked that day or not.

That’s the financial expression of abundance thinking. Instead of protecting what you have from running out, you build something that keeps replenishing. There is a real peace in that, and it’s more accessible than most people realize.

I can’t go back and buy that land. That ship sailed a long time ago, probably while I was cleaning someone’s teeth and worrying about overhead.

But I can change the lens I’m looking through going forward. Scarcity kept me from taking a closer look at that opportunity. Abundance, financial, relational, spiritual, is worth looking at closely.

What would you do differently if you genuinely believed there was enough?

Has scarcity thinking ever cost you something? I’d love to hear your story in the comments. And if this post resonated with you, please share it with someone who needs it.

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