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Index Of The Seven Deadly Sins Links:
Although popularized by the epic poem, The Divine Comedy
The version I am using as the basis of this series of posts will date back to the 6th Century AD using the nomenclature of the Catholic Pope, Gregory the Great.
These sins are ordered from the least deadly to the most egregious (and this series of posts will follow the same ordering).
The fifth Deadly Sin was coined Ira (later donning the name of Wrath)
“Strong anger can only make you weaker than you already are” ―
Wrath can can cause you to be in a mental state that can cloud your judgement leading to bad decisions, financial or otherwise.
Fortunately wrath does not have much of a foothold in the financial world as it does in the physical world but there are some examples of it that are worth mentioning.
In today’s litigious society it seems that every incident needs to generate a corresponding lawsuit.
However sometimes the legal and time costs end up outweighing the projected rewards.
Individuals who still choose to undergo this process may have the sin of Wrath guiding them as they are letting their emotions dictate their actions with only vengeance as a motivating factor.
I have mentioned the bitter drawn out divorce proceedings and the subsequent frivolous lawsuit that my ex-wife pursued and lost before.
This was done purely out of vengeance as she even stated, “How dare you divorce me?” at one point.
I do not know the final legal bill for her civil lawsuit proceedings, which thankfully, unlike the divorce, I did not have to subsidize.
I can only imagine it racked up quite a legal fee as she had not only her original divorce lawyer but also added a second lawyer as co-counsel from another firm to represent her during the week long jury trial.
My ex-wife sought $4 million in perceived emotional damages and received nothing at all in the end.
Her overall financial status therefore took a large step backwards when you factor in the legal fees.
This is Wrath at work.
Had she not undertaken this second legal proceeding, she could have led a comfortable life with all the assets she had gained through the divorce.
Another variation of how wrath may impact finance can be seen in business relations.
For example, say there is Business A who needs a partner business to supply a critical component.
There are two available options Business B and C, both with same quality product but business B is clearly less expensive.
The CEO, despite this information, goes with Business C as years earlier Business B beat out his company in a bid for a lucrative contract.
This CEO has forgone a financial advantage, doing his or her company a disservice purely out of spite, a form of Wrath.
He or she still bears a grudge against Business B and a more beneficial business relationship thereby is lost.
“Anger gets you into trouble, ego keeps you in trouble.” ―
This phenomena is not limited to individuals as on a more global scale this can be the basis of trade wars between countries.
A perceived insult can lead to poor financial decisions based on the effect of Wrath on the mind.
In the medical world, many physicians became enraged as the combination of increasing government regulations and decreasing reimbursements caused many to simply leave the medical profession altogether.
Whether this was or was not a sound financial decision is yet to be seen, but I do feel that wrath did have some element in the decision to give up a high six figure income.
As with any Deadly Sin there is a corresponding Heavenly Virtue that serves as its counterpart.
For Wrath, this counterpart is Forgiveness.
“Forgiveness has nothing to do with absolving a criminal of his crime. It has everything to do with relieving oneself of the burden of being a victim–letting go of the pain and transforming oneself from victim to survivor.” ―
Now I am going to be the first to say that forgiveness is not an easy thing to do.
I still, to this day, harbor pure hatred to every individual who went against me in my divorce that caused me to completely lose my daughter for a period of 6 years.
I do not think any amount of time will pass that will ever let me soften that stance.
I certainly know I am not big enough of a man to actually give forgiveness to any of them (but that is my cross to bear).
But if you can forgive someone, it is true that the benefits to your own psyche far outweigh the difficulty of saying those words to someone who has wronged you.
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If you want to see wrath at work just look at Twitter ?
Lol. Good point (although out of all the social media platforms, I think Twitter is the friendliest) 🙂
NOT true! Twitter is the worse. It’s so easy to create burner accounts so that trolls can keep trolling. Lots of wrath going on without any sort of consideration, kindness, or forgiveness in the Twitterverse.
Instagram is more friendly IMHO.
Interesting. Don’t think I’ve had a bad experience on Twitter at all (knock on wood). Reddit has kicked my butt though. lol
The funny thing is… sometimes I read blogs really fast at work (simply because I obviously don’t want to be distracted from patient care).
Anyway, I read the title really fast and saw: “The Seven Deadly Sins FIRE Edition: IRA /Wealth.”
I was like… since when is having wealth in an IRA a deadly sin? LOL!
Having wrath is not good for you, your health, business, finances, well being, or for others… it’s just not good for anything. It’s always best to act with kindness and compassion.
LOL. I thought it was pretty funny when I saw that they used to the term IRA as the name of the sin way back when.
I agree wrath is probably one of the more self-destructive emotions out there. Does nobody good.
Wait I had this thought too, I was like wuttttttt why is an IRA bad. Haha
And I love that Strahan quote. Once, during a heavily emotional time, my mother told me that she wasn’t going hate the person any more because they don’t get to put that burden on her — that it wasn’t fair to make her bear that.
That’s stuck with me. My mom’s a pretty wise lady, turns out.
Lol MFM. You can blame Gregory the great for creating confusion between ira and IRA. I was just thinking that’s probably where the word irate for its etiology from. Your mom definitely sounds like a wise one?
Great post! So sorry to hear about your painful divorce. Sounds like the lawyers were the real winners ? Forgiveness is hard… it took my husband and I years to get over the fact that he would ultimately pay a total of 2 million in alimony to his ex-wife (great relationships with his kids, a couple of weddings, grandkids… all put things into enough perspective that we all get along well now). In unrelated news… today in my office I was listening to my ancient iPod and when Liz Phair’s “XRay Man” came on , I thought of you and… Read more »
Thanks Kristina for your comment, I have to check out that song. Not familiar with it and that is pretty cool you thought of me when you heard it.
You are absolutely right about lawyers feasting when a divorce is contentious. It is in their self interest not yours to have a divorce as contentious as possible so that they have more billable hours. They should make them have a fiduciary designation. Lol Wow 2 million in alimony is insane. I’m so sorry. Glad you have come to grips with it.
I think you are simply being a human being XRV. I can not imagine how awful if was for you to be kept away from your daughter.
But hopefully with each passing delightful year together, she will help you with lasting memories that will dwarf those apart.
Thank you DMB. I definitely have been making up for lost time since she’s been here. I can’t believe 3 years has already flown by and she will be starting high school next year
“Wrath” is about the exercise of power and the exercise of power is governed by justice. There is a reason justice is displayed by scales since unbridled exercise of power leads to self destruction at some point (as in the case of your ex wife) so the exercise needs to be tempered with reason. Kindness is the exercise of power with the object of using that power for the benefit of another and can be limiting harm while maintaining justice as much as benevolence. A truce in a war once one side has lost and total annihilation is on the… Read more »
Great philosophical take Gasem. To be honest most of the people who have injured me in the past regarding the divorce and subsequent custody issue with my daughter are furthest from thought in my day to day life. Every now and then though I do utter some curses under my breath directed against those people. I know it will amount to nothing but it allows me to vent and make sure I stoke the flames of hatred towards them every rare time. It’s been 8 years since the debacle and I definitely know this is happening less and less frequently… Read more »