Philosophy toward money

We're all illiterates....financially.
Now that I have your attention, I'd like to discuss the philosophy toward money and making money. I don't mean to jump from topic to topic, but I think this will be a good starting point to have our financial intelligence progress over time to the point where we're all feeling somewhat comfortable with personal finance and investing. This topic was inspired by the book "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" by Robert Kiyosaki.
One of the topics it discusses is people's attitudes toward making money. One of many good statements from the book is "While money has the power to make you a slave to it - it also has the power to set you free."
I'll put some perspective to this thought and I'd like to get your comments on this. We've all heard from our parents to study hard, get good grades so that we can get a good paying job where if you work hard, you can move up in a company. One issue with this ingrained teaching is that it doesn't allow us to think outside the office building box. From the time I got my first job to now, I've seen a pay increase but like most people, the more I made, the more I spent. Such as, renting an apartment to buying a house to buying a bigger house. Now that we have a child, our expenses have increased even more. With the pressure of increasing expenses, we end up having to work even harder to ensure we excel our job to get that promotion. Now, that's a rat race and a half if I ever saw it. And this is what the book refers to being a slave to money. We spend more time worrying about how we're going to pay for all our expenses and less time ensuring that our relationship with our spouse and family is growing. Experts tell us that our home we buy is our biggest investment but how is it that our "investment" extracts so much of our income instead of replenishing it? What hasn't been taught by most, including my parents and the school systems I grew up in is that we need to buy assets to build our wealth and stop the rat race. The book classifies assets as investments that generate income. Hence your home isn't considered an asset for the author because it drains your monthly income. I tend to agree with this perspective. Unless your home eases your monthly expenses - it puts a lot of stress on your personal finance. It usually makes up a good percentage of your expenses on a monthly basis.
By building assets, you are going down the path of being the master of money instead of money being the master of you.
Let me know your thoughts on this topic. Please click on the comment button below and provide feedback.