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Core value · Prosperity family
Prosperity
Thriving financially and materially
What does prosperity mean as a core value?
Prosperity as a core value means wanting your household, business or community to thrive and keep moving forward, with money working as a platform for everything else.
Things going well, and continuing to go well: that’s the feeling prosperity describes. It’s a household, business or community that is growing, with bills paid without anxiety, room to invest and a sense that next year will be better than this one. If prosperity sits near the top of your list, money is only part of it. Prosperity is the evidence that effort is turning into something solid, and the platform that makes other things possible for you and the people around you.
What does prosperity look like in practice?
- You review your finances regularly and notice when the trend starts bending the wrong way.
- You judge a new job or venture partly on whether it moves your household forward, as well as on how it feels.
- You invest in skills, property or a pension long before the return is visible.
- You want the team or business you lead to grow, and you take it personally when it stalls.
- You’re pleased when friends and neighbours do well, because you see prosperity as something that spreads.
When is prosperity overplayed?
When prosperity takes over, growth becomes the only measure of a good year. You can find yourself chasing the next rise in income while the time and relationships it was meant to support get squeezed. Standing still starts to feel like failure, even when standing still would be perfectly fine. The grounded version treats thriving as a means to something. One thing you could try is writing down what prosperity is actually for in your life, and what enough would look like if you reached it.
Often confused with
Prosperity vs Wealth
Wealth is the stock of money and assets you hold. Prosperity is the wider sense of thriving and moving forward, which can be true on a modest income that’s growing.
Prosperity vs Abundance
Abundance is having more than enough right now. Prosperity is more about progress: building, growing and doing well over time.
Prosperity vs Success
Success is achieving what you set out to do, in any part of life. Prosperity is specifically about material and financial flourishing.
Questions to sit with
- What would need to be true about your finances for you to feel you were thriving?
- Who else is your prosperity for, and do they know?
- Which part of your life has paid for the growth you’ve had in the last five years?
More values in Prosperity
Material success and what it makes possible.
About the author
Matt Rutherford is a Career and Leadership Coach. The Values Finder is the same exercise he uses with his coaching clients. He also writes Stuff that MattRs, a weekly newsletter with practical ideas to help you think clearer and work better.
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