Are you cursed to be poor?

Are you cursed to be poor for the rest of your life? I was.

Did you put a curse of poverty on yourself? Believe it or not, almost all of us did.

Can you recognize the not so obvious signs of poverty and the curse in your life and others?

For most of my grown-up life, a lot of people thought I was “well off”. My parents were hardworking professionals, I always had a roof over my head, and when I went on to live my own life, I had the trappings of a middle class professional.

I always lived at a decent address, mingled with the right crowd, always had a car, I even had an expat wife.

But just like with cancer, unless the tests show it, you never really see it. Someone might even say, you’re just imagining it. But one day, a Pastor who had no personal knowledge of me simply walked in to the room and said: “There’s a curse of poverty in your life”.

All of my defenses came down. For the first time in my life here was someone who saw what I felt but could not explain. Here was someone who did not stumble over the material things, the packaging, the signatures or the brand. He simply saw the curse.

I never thought of it as a “curse”. I simply called it a difficult life. I categorized it as an inability to properly save, invest and profit. I excused it as a failure of others to lead me, teach me and bankroll me to become “Rich”.

But on that day, I found out that it started with a relative calling us names and saying we were useless, good for nothing mouths to feed. The Tagalog version was a lot more painful at seven years old. But children tend to forget.

Those words and other similar “stupid things we say without meaning them statements were made by neighbors, teachers, employers, even people we loved and who said they loved us”.

After a while, we start believing that they’re just words. We even quote the nursery rhyme: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but your words will never hurt me”. Unfortunately when enough people tell you you’re stupid or poor in Math, or you’ll never amount to anything, there comes a point when there’s nothing else to believe.

The minute you believe, you have given others as well as yourself permission to live out the curse and suffer it’s consequence.

Have you ever noticed, how we have all agreed that Filipinos have a “crab mentality”? When you ask someone how they are or how business is, they almost feel obligated to tell you that life is tough or business is hard. And if by chance they tell you business is good, they do so almost with a sense of guilt!

It’s all part of the repeated ritual of cursing ourselves. Whether you say “life is tough” or “Filipino drivers are insane” or “your wife is stupid”, the fact is the curses are repeated by the giver and the taker.

In the case of poverty, it also comes in varying forms and degrees. Those who have given up the fight, give up their dignity as well as their pride. They’ll take what they can get in any form and from any source. Sadly the curse of poverty is also passed on as an inheritance. In heart, in mind and in soul, the poverty resides as a spirit perpetually squatting and denying you the right to make a choice.

In anger, I rose up against the curses thrown at me. But in my immaturity and lack of wisdom that was all I could do – be angry and be proud. With that pride-filled spirit I surrounded myself with the imaginary wealth of a job title, a self-created stature that would not have survived real scrutiny, I collected “things” and “stuff”. It was all about image. Funny how image and imagination have the same roots.

Worst of all, my rickety-wobbly world, was held together by people who had me on professional or emotional strings. There were certain days when I wondered if I were a slave or an addict?

But just like in the movies, curses can be broken the same way they were laid. You use the written word, turn it to the spoken word and you live on believing. Since that spell breaking afternoon, I have moved on from being cursed by man to being blessed by God. I have gone from renting to owning a home, from asking to giving, yes I have been blessed.

Last Sunday, my dear friend Pastor Robert “Obama” Hern encouraged us to share the declaration against poverty and to make a declaration for prosperity. Do take a minute and declare it, for you and for our nation.

Break poverty and take a vow of generosity based on 2 Corinthians 9:10

I Renounce poverty:

God, I repent for believing in the lies of the enemy. It is not your will for me to be poor. I renounce anything that holds your abundance from me. I renounce anything that I have spoken against prosperity and success in my life. I renounce poverty and the spirit of poverty.

I declare Generosity:

God, you are for me. You are my source, my supplier.

You will supply me bread for food. You will supply me seeds to sow. I will sow and I will have a mighty harvest!

I will be generous in all occasions!

God, I receive your provisions, prosperity and success.

In Jesus name….AMEN! –Cito Beltran (The Philippine Star)