Jun 9, 20222 min read

Stinginess- the Sickness

On the other end of the spectrum are the selfish, greedy people, the ones that are pained by the thought of giving. They believe that they deserve the world; by sharing with others, they feel that they will have less for themselves and can't stomach that thought.

Greedy people may or may not have money, but this is not relevant at all to their feelings. Even if they had enough money that they were literally tripping over their gold and jewels, if an emaciated beggar knocked at their door, asking for a bite to eat, these stingy people would not even be willing to give their stale old bread to keep the beggar from starving.

While not so common in its extreme form, stinginess is a sickness that is all to prevalent in the world at large. It can afflict the rich and the poor, the young and the old. It is an addiction to money, an unhealthy connection to money that you can't bear to see it go towards others.

Taking stinginess one step further is miserliness. Dictionary.com's definition of this word: "a person who lives in wretched circumstances in order to save and hoard money." (I'll be getting myself into trouble here because some people might think I fit this definition, but I'll deal with that a little further down.) Note the word hoard. It means saving but with an extremely negative connotation.

Miserly people are stingy to the nth degree. They are so addicted to money that they can't bear to spend a cent, not even on themselves, and hence live in wretched circumstances. They just want to watch the money pile up. They collect money the way some other people collect junk. It has no use to them; they just need to accumulate it and watch their collection grow. These people are obsessed with owning money and not even with the luxuries money can buy.