By Rev. Gillian V Harris, M.S.P.
January 20, 2018

First thing I wonder is …why the Pig? Why isn’t it a rhino bank? Or an elephant bank?! Those are big bellied animals. And Elephants have great memories!  Why the pig?! Is it because pigs are smart?! When piggy banks were first created – did they know how intelligent pigs are?! Or was it just a coinkidink!?!  

Ok, so there’s that.  THEN I wondered… is a ‘piggy bank’ a good thing or bad thing psychologically?! Does a piggy bank support a psychology of ‘lack’? A need to hoard?  Or Hoarding in the event of some terrible thing like the infamous ‘rainy day’!  By preparing for rainy days, do we not then, create rainy days?!  Just a thought! Do you save money with the expectation of some expensive terrible thing happening in the future? Or do we save money with the expectation of some wonderful desire being met in the future? – Like a trip to Europe or the desire to buy a house, business or something else large and wonderful?!!   I guess this would be on an individual basis.  In keeping with the law of attraction we need to be conscious of our ‘expectation’.  For those who say “every time I save money, something happens and I have to spend it” are not only basing that on their life statistics but they are creating more of the same statistics with belief that that is the way it is.  “Every time I take 2 steps forward I have to take 3 steps back!” Those are powerful words. If you’ve ever said them, you might want to cease and desist on that kind of verbiage!!!

Ok, let’s move forward with the psychology of the beloved piggy bank!  It has been made very clear to me that money can NOT make you (or ME) happy!  I know what you’re  thinkin’ A spare $million would make you absolutely giddy! Well, so guess what? Having that much money might indeed make you happy but only if you move a bunch of it to your SAVINGS ACCOUNT!!! Yup! We’re still talkin’ piggy bank psych 101, here!!

A recent study finds it’s not about making a high salary.  It's NOT about a fat income! The magnitude of your happiness depends on where that money ends up! Like, where it is… right now!   There’s a cool article in Psychology Today (Posted June 12, 2014) by Meg Selig of ‘Changepower’ a survey Ally Bank (which she also noted was not necessarily an objective resource! Lol!).  This study, in summary, says that earning more salary only raised the happiness vibration a smidge – IF at all.  Let me put that another way! Getting a raise from $30k pr year to $180K pr year only raises a persons happiness vibration a teeny weeny bit.  It's all about the cushion! The survey was clearly able to see a correlation between SAVINGS and happiness. The more money saved the higher number of respondents were happy.  Earning more as opposed to saving more didn’t make the difference in happiness as much as saving more did. Surprised by that result?! You can chalked it up to one word: Survival!

With a healthy savings you don’t have to fear the unknown… The unknown can happen and you can rest assured you’ll be able to handle it! You can be proud of taking care of yourself in this way, providing yourself independence and an overall sense of well-being, just by knowing you have a financial cushion.  That cushion that allows you to freely function on this planet.  

An uncomfortable fact comes from numerous much larger results that about half of Americans don’t even have 3 months of living expenses for an emergency. Six to 8 months is what’s usually recommended!  Having a cushion in the bank like THAT brings peace of mind.  So, making the decision to save instead of splurge is actually an act of self-nurturing. 

The psychology of the Piggy Bank is still kind of a bop on the head when you realize the traditional ones had to be broken in order to get the money!  Anybody remember that?!  I think thats where the term 'breaking the bank' originally came from! Dont quote me on that but it sure makes sense!  Asked Google and apparently there are scholars who believe the term was born around the 1600s and defined those moments when gamblers would win more money than the house (bank) had!!!!! talk about a conundrum!! 

Back to the piggy banks. Now we've got the little rubber stopper that you remove. Then you just shake the money out! Lol!  I want to say , maybe times have changed and we can trust ourselves more so we can have piggy banks that are so easily accessible?! But no. That’s not it! Everything’s so doggone expensive, who wants to keep buying and breaking piggy banks!!! Gives the term ‘break the bank’ new meaning, right?!

As a kid I felt it was punishment to have to put the money in a piggy bank and NOT spend it! O MG! I tried lots of ways to sneak the money out through the slot so I didn’t have to break the bank! What I didn’t understand was that I was going to be a lot happier if I delayed my gratification. I get it now.

I’ll close on a startling fact:  Studies say, most Americans have saved only an average of $3000 for retirement!!!