Once there was this guy who lived up in the mountains. Through a particularly strange string of events, he’d found himself with quite a bit of money, enough to quit his job for good. At first he spent time traveling around, and learning about different cultures, a few languages here and there. But when the thrill had worn off, he longed for place to spend the rest of his days in quite solitude. On thing he learned about himself was that he rather enjoyed being by himself, and could spend hours just sitting and gazing out at a peaceful meadow or countryside farm.

So he spent time searching for the right place, until he stumbled on this area in a semi rural mountainous area. He bought several hundred acres, after making sure there was sufficient water, and electricity wouldn’t be a problem. He had to contract with some construction engineers to get his electricity and phone lines wired in, but that wasn’t much of a worry.

After everything was built and set up, he had himself a nice cabin that was right on the edge of a large meadow, with a rather large stream running through the middle of it, and a fairly dense forest. Traveling through the meadow, it would become more and more flat after a few miles, and then open up into a large valley, which channeled down to meet the main highway. The road came only part way to the valley, after that there was access only by off road vehicle.

He’d gotten specific permits from the county planning office, and surprisingly had to sign several legal release forms, as for a good part of the winter, his cabin would become completely inaccessible, except by helicopter. That was why he chose to build his cabin on the border between the meadow and the woods.

Should a particular emergency arise, it was still feasible to get to his place by helicopter, even in the deepest snow of winter. But just a mile or so into the woods, he would be completely cut off for until the spring thaw. While he liked the outdoors, and enjoyed being alone for long stretches of time, not having access to emergency medical aid was not something he wanted to worry about.

During the other months, getting from his cabin to the main road through the valley below took a couple hours, and then to the nearest town where he could buy supplies was another hour. So he would make a run every couple of weeks, and load up his pickup truck with as many supplies as he would fit.

Make no mistake, because I’m using the word “supplies,” please don’t picture some scraggly mountain man buying beef jerky and shotgun shells. This guy liked his modern creature comforts just like the rest of us. In his cabin he had a large flat screen TV that was of course connected, as well as his Internet connection via satellite linkup, and having traveled the world extensively, he had acquired a taste for fine foods. He had an industrial size refrigerator, and a large walk in freezer that he kept fully stocked at all times, as well as an impressive wine cellar he had built to specific specifications to match identically that of a restaurant he’d grown quite fond of in the south of France.

But on to our story. One thing he particularly enjoyed was fishing in the stream/river that had started somewhere up in the mountains, ran down in front of his cabin (albeit a couple hundred yards awards away, as recommended by the builders) and became very large sometimes down the meadow.

There were plenty of trout, mostly rainbow, but a few brown trout in the stream. Despite all of the exotic food that he special ordered from time to time from the specialty stores in town, nothing tasted as good as freshly caught trout. He had developed several recipes that he used to prepare them, his most favorite being a simple lemon, garlic and butter concoction.

As he approached the stream, he found spot to start fishing. Long a fan of lures, he chose a spinner of no particular important, loaded it up and tossed it in. He slowly reeled it in, tossed it out again.

He did see a few interested fish, but none of them seemed too interested in his lure. He tried another lure, same thing. This wasn’t out of the ordinary. He’d once gone eight days in a row without catching any fish, so this wasn’t particularly frustrating, or out of the ordinary.

Until he saw it.

As he slowly reeled his lure back, after the 17th cast (had he been counting) there was a very large, very gold/orange fish following his lure. At first he thought it was one of those Japanese carp that some people build ponds for in their back yards, but it’s shape wasn’t quite right. The strange thing about this fish was that it didn’t immediately retreat when his lure drew close to the shore as he reeled it in. it seemed pause a little bit, swim up stream, and then drift just pas the point where the lure was to be pulled from the water. As if it somehow knew in advance where the lure was going to be extracted from the water.

After he set his rod for another cast the fish quickly darted back down stream. But when he cast and reeled in his line again, there was the same fish. Except this time, he was the only fish there. He performed the same peculiar behavior following the lure in, and then darting upstream, and drifting down just to the point of extraction. Then he (it) would linger just long enough, and then literally turn and dart downstream.

This went on for about more casts, when he decided to try another spot. He walked down stream for about thirty minutes, and found a spot where there was a large bend in the stream, where the flow slowed considerably, enough for large pool to form, much like a small lake.

He walked around the lake, stopping in several places. Each time the same thing happened. He’d cast out his lure, reel it, and it would be followed by the same peculiar fish, that would do the same peculiar thing.

Finally he decided to call it quits, as the sun would be setting within an hour or so. He walked back up stream toward his cabin. Just before he arrived, he decided he’d try one last cast. But there was that same fish, only this time, it didn’t dart away so quickly when he pulled is lure from the water.

He swam back and forth, seemingly agitated, jumping from the water at each turn. Perplexed, the stood and stared.

And then it happened.

There was a monstrous earthquake, that seemed to last several minutes. He could hear the rocks up through the forest come tumbling down the hillside, the loud cracking of trees as they plowed relentlessly through the woods.

When the shaking stopped, the fisherman looked down at the valley where he’d been fishing all day. All along the side of the river, as far as he could see, almost exactly parallel to the river, was a giant crevice that had opened up in the earth, and was slowly pulling all the water from the stream into it. Pretty soon the stream, now a gushing river, had completely changed direction.

He turned, quite shaken, and walked slowly back to his cabin, not sure what had just happened. One thing he did know, and that was he didn’t think he’d be eating fish any time soon.

(Advertisement)

To understand the signs all around you, and save yourself from sheer destruction, click the link below:

I met a couple of my buddies for lunch the other day. Some guys I hang out with sometimes. We were talking about the recent economic conditions, and how messed up they are for everybody. Our particular industry that we are in is slowly spiraling down the drain. A few years ago, in this one particular niche, there was plenty of demand that would easily support any old shop that decided to open up. You didn’t need much experience, or even business knowledge of savvy. If you just sold this particular product, you could make money.

Things like that happen all throughout a normal business cycle. For any particular product or service that is offered by a bunch of different companies, it can be tough to separate the exceptional services from the mediocre, and even the lucky. Whenever there is a general economic boom, you could swing a dead cat a hit a slew of successful businesses.

Similarly in the stock market. In the roaring nineties (and even as far back as the roaring twenties), anybody with half a brain could, through some real experience, convince themselves they were a savvy investor, as pretty much any tech stock, especially Internet stocks, were doubling every couple months as a matter of course. Of course, then the bubble eventually burst, and wiped out a lot of so-called “savvy” investors.

So it is with any market boom/bust cycle. On the boom side, anybody can set up shop, make tons of cash, and convince themselves they’ve discovered the secrets to a successful market. But the true winners are the ones that survive the bust and continue to make money.

Like the particular industry my friends and I are involved in, ten years ago, any housewife without any education could set up shop and make a decent profit. But with the economy shrinking, as many peoples disposable incomes, making some purchases are no longer no-brainers. People are actually forced to make some hard choices how they spend their money.

We noticed this old guy sitting next to us, and he was kind of going alone with our conversation. He wasn’t eve’s dropping or anything, it was just a quite café without a lot of other people, and he seemed to be nodding along with certain parts of the conversation. Slowly he kind of joined the conversation.

That in and of itself is an interesting thing. There’s the guy who shows up to a few people who are talking, and interjects himself rudely, and tries to hijack the conversation. Perhaps you’ve seen this guy at a party or a bar. Then there’s a guy who happens to be in the area, and slowly over time, your conversation circle slowly expands, like some kind of social amoeba or something.

Anyway, this old guy happened to be a farmer, and he was telling us how farmers every year must make a tough decision on what to grow. Because the planting time to the harvest time is quite a few months, a wrong decision can have some pretty harsh results. If you belong to some kind of system where the government offers some kind of guaranteed protection, where they’ll buy your stuff at a certain price, this isn’t such a big deal. But they only offer a certain price for certain products. And the government price is usually on the low side. So while it’s safe to farm that way, at least in this neck of the woods, it is anything but lucrative.

Which is why many farmers attempt to grow things not on the government approved list of guaranteed purchases. While this is entails a lot more risk, the rewards are much better. The rub is that you have to predict six or eight months ahead of time what the market will be like. Of course, if you grow some kind of product that is always in high demand, then you’ve got yourself a good business. But then again, there’s always competition for that same product ever year.

So you’ve got to not only accurately predict what the market demand will be, bit you’ve got to have a pretty good handle on your competition as well.

There’s much more that goes into farming that just planting seed and waiting for them to grow. This farmer was telling us that they too, experience the same boom/bust cycle. Somebody will start to grow a new crop, and it will do very well. Then the next year they’ll be even more demand, and more farmers growing that same product. But then a few years down the road, the market will be saturated, and they’ll be more supply than demand, and the farmers that joined in too late in the game will be left holding the bag. Literally. A bag of product that they can’t sell.

The secret, he said, (which we listened to intently, as this was some old guy who’d been around the block a few times) was to always be aware of your circumstances, and your abilities. He said a lot of farmers get stuck in growing the same thing year after year, and get dependent on market demand. When market demand turns sour, they have no place to go. But those that are always successful always keep something hidden in their back pocket. Always have an idea in the back of their mind for a new crop or a new product in case the market suddenly turns.

To some people, a field of dirt is a burden that can only produce corn or wheat or whatever you’re used to producing. But to others, a field of dirt is pure magic, and will grow whatever seeds you plant. If you keep your eyes and ears open for opportunities, and choose wisely, and plant the right seeds, you will have an extremely lucrative harvest year after year after year.

To expand your resources in the present and make the best possible choices for the future, click on the link below:

Powerful Metaphysics

I’ve been reading more of Dawkins lately, namely “The Selfish Gene” and I’m astounded by it’s insights. The basic premise is that all behavior of all organisms is strictly rooted in pure selfishness of the individual organisms, be it the mold on the cheese in your refrigerator, a baby kangaroo, or you. Whenever there appears to be some kind of altruistic behavior, it can easily be explained in terms of selfishness of the individual. Evolution has filtered out the behaviors that aren’t the most beneficial to the survival of the individual.

One example is fighting among animals. Many male animals will fight to maintain dominance of the heard. Countless studies have shown that whoever is the top dog, or the head wolf, or the alpha chimp, will get most of the females (and most of the sex) and most of the food. Being on top is extremely important in the animal world. (And yes, humans are animals, in case you’re wondering.)

The interesting thing is that when animals fight, either over a woman, or a scrap of food, or a particularly valuable piece of real estate, they will rarely fight to the death. They usually spend lots of time posturing and staring each other down. And when they do get into it rarely do they fight to the death. As soon as one animal is down, the victor refrains from delivering the final deathblow, like in the gladiator movies.

Why is this? Wouldn’t it make sense just to kill your rival and be done with it, in case he returns later, stronger and more ready to kill you? Actually, no it doesn’t.

There is a complex mathematical model of inherent behavior that animals have when they get into a fight. And depending one how it works out over time, certain behaviors are more likely to survive, generation after generation. In a society filled with animals that fight to the death, the fights would be much more bloody and extended, and even the victor would have a large chance of sustaining bodily injury. So a gene that says, “fight your enemy to the death” wouldn’t be very popular. Consider a group of animals where every one had an instinct to “fight to the death.” Every time there was a fight, there would be one dead animal, and one seriously messed up animal. It wouldn’t take long for the population to diminish.

Now consider what would happen if in that, “fight to the death” society, came a mutant, who had an instinct that said, “when threatened, run away.” That animal would actually have a pretty good chance of mating, and making more copies of itself, as it would always be healthy, while most of the other animals would be busy fighting to the death.

Consider the opposite. Imagine a group of animals that had an instinct of “when provoked, run away.” Nobody would ever fight, and nobody would ever be injured. But all it would take would be one mutant that had the “fight to the death” gene, and he would pretty much clean house. He would scare away all the other males, and he’d get all the women to himself. Of course, in few generations, there would be lots of more fight to the deathers, until there would be equilibrium.

Of course, fight to the death, and run like the wind are not the only two possible strategies. Other strategies are “stare your opponent down for at least a minute,” or “never attack, but if attacked respond with force,” or “attack once, if there is a counter attack, run like the wind.” All these strategies, of course, are automatic and completely unconscious. The animals in question don’t learn from previous encounters. They just come with built in, pre programmed fighting strategies, and the law of averages takes care of the rest. Every animal is trying to get the most out of his environment, with the least amount of pain or effort. (Sounds like us.)

When watching a couple of tigers fighting, and seeing that the victor doesn’t quickly snap the neck of his opponent, it can seem like they have some pre arranged fighting rules, like MMA. They don’t. It’s just that successive generations have filtered out the strategies that don’t work well. And by not working well, that means living long enough to make more copies of yourself.

Luckily, even though humans are animals, we have conscious minds. We can learn from our mistakes, and plan for our future. We can either try and get the most out the situation right then and there, at the expense of whoever gets in our way, or we can take a longer look at things, and plant seeds that we can harvest later in life.

Robbing a bank can provide a large, quick sum of money. There are plenty of risks involved (I refer you to the recent Johnny Depp movie “Public Enemies,”) but can provide a quick payoff. The underlying intent is pure selfishness. I want money, I want it now, and I don’t care who gets hurt in the process. High potential payoff, high risk of negative failure (going to jail, or being shot.)

If you are a bank robber, you can learn from your mistakes. Plan your heists accordingly, so there is less risk each time, and more payoff.

Investing in the stock market over ten years can provide a large sum of money. There are plenty of risks involved, but can provide a large payoff. The underlying intent is pure selfishness. I want money, but I don’t plan on spending it until I’m ready to retire. The only person that stands to lose anything is me. High potential payoff, medium risk of neutral failure (all your invested money ends up being equal to zero.)

If you are long-term investor, you can study your trades, learn from your mistakes, and have a fair chance of having long-term success.

Sticking fifty bucks under your mattress every week can provide you with a tidy sum of money ten or twenty years in the future. The motive is pure selfishness. There is very low risk. There is a fairly even trade off. You don’t spend your money today, so you can spend it tomorrow. You know exactly what the cash amount will be in the future. There is very low risk of any loss, other than losing the value of your money due to inflation. You can’t really learn from your mistakes, unless you by a new mattress, or learn various stuffing under the mattress techniques.

You can bust into a bank, and steal other people’s money. You are selfish. You benefit, they suffer. Win lose.

Or you can “loan” you money to a company, through the purchase of their stocks. They get money to invest into their business. You get to be a part owner. They use your money, they grow their business, your shares grow, and you make money. You both benefit from each other’s selfishness. Win win.

Or you stick your money under a mattress. Nobody benefits but you, but nobody else benefits, and nobody else loses. Win.

Three strategies for making, with three different risk/reward ratios. But like I said early, we have conscious memories, and can visualize a reasonably good approximation of the future. You can look back into your past, see what strategies you implemented, and what results they’ve produced. You can then look into your future and see if these same strategies are likely to give you what you want a few years down the line. If not, you can easily change strategies.

Three different levels of selfishness. I suggest to you that the best and most lucrative selfishness is win win. It stands to reason that it would be a good idea then, to find as many other people that you can where your selfishness, and there selfishness will overlap in some mutually beneficial way.

No reason for stealing, no reason for fighting to the death. Respect your own selfish desires, respect other people’s selfish desires, find as many overlaps as possible, and everybody’s a winner.

I remember I went on this backpacking trip once. We had planned it out fairly thoroughly, reading several guidebooks, and buying maps with different levels detail. One thing that we couldn’t really plan on was the size of the rivers. The mountains we were planning on hiking in were in the Sierra Nevada range in California. Those mountains have several thousand small lakes, which are fed by the annual rainfall, creating several thousand streams and rivers of various sizes.

Because these streams and rivers are so numerous, you inevitably have to cross one or two large ones if you are going on hike that is longer than a day or two. Since these mountains are kept as pure as possible, from a human interaction point of view, doing anything other than keep debris from blocking established trails is strictly prohibited. This means that no bridges exist, or do strategic placements of stones. It’s not uncommon to spend several hours wandering up and down a riverbank looking for an appropriate place to cross.

Often time there is not real danger, but when hiking with a pair of wet boots is never a pleasant experience. It makes it much easier to get blisters, which can ruin an entire trip. Crossing a river without getting wet is ideal.

Generally speaking, when looking for a place to cross, you either look for a point where the river is particularly narrow, where crossing will only take a couple strategically places steps. Other times the best you can do is find a place that is relatively shallow, and simply walk across. If you are lucky, and the bottom is relatively smooth, you can take off your shoes and wade across, with the water hopefully not getting higher than your waist. Keep in mind this water is freshly melted snow, so it is really cold.

The ideal is a slow moving river that is shallow enough and narrow enough to not get your boots wet. The worst I’ve ever experienced was when we had to strip down to our underwear, carry our packs over our heads, and cross that way. The best place we could find to cross was about four meters across, and about a meter deep. Luckily the bottom was sandy, and the water was flowing slow enough that it didn’t pose any danger. But it was really, really cold.

I was listening to an interview on the radio the other and they were talking about this book called “Flow,” where the author described the experience when you are completely and fully engaged in something to the exclusion of all else. It is a fascinating feeling, usually experienced by athletes and artists. If you’ve ever experienced it, then you know what it’s like. Everything seems to disappear, and any conscious interference that exists normally is virtually shut off. You become a machine, fully focused on the event at hand. It’s almost as if you are watching yourself flawlessly performing some task.

One of the most esoteric conversations you can have with yourself is regarding the metaphysical flow of money. You can look at it as a purely right-brained physical based entity, obeying the laws of physics and of cause and effect. You do certain things, and you get a certain amount of money. You want certain things and you give up a certain amount of money. Other schools of thought, usually thought a little bit on the new agey side, teach the money should be thought of as a flow of energy, and that all you need to do is open yourself up, in both directions. That is, in order to have money flowing in just as readily as it flows out, you should set up your consciousness to appreciate the exchange in both directions. You should be just as happy to receive product or services in exchange for your money, as you should in receiving money for your products or services.

I’ve even read some suggestions saying you should write a big “Thank You” on your checks to the IRS every year.

The interesting thing about money is that if flows whether we want it to or not. For the whole of human history, until only a few thousand years ago, there wasn’t any money. Now there is hundreds of millions traded every day on the Forex Exchange. This is just different country swapping out their currencies at the end of every single day.

Whatever your own personal beliefs about money are, money is there, money is flowing, and it would probably do you some good to figure out a way to get in on the action. It’s not like there is a finite size of the pie, and once the pieces are gone, they’re gone. The money supply increases every year, and the ways and paths that it flows increase as well.

And the cool thing about money flow is that you don’t have to worry about getting swept away by the current, or worrying about keeping your boots dry. You can just dive right in. Kick the boulders out of the way and let if flow. They’ll be plenty more where that came from.

There has been much written, spoken about, and talked about regarding the difference between a scarcity mindset and an abundance mindset. These two seemingly ubiquitous concepts can change your perception of reality itself. But do we really understand what they mean?

I can understand the mechanics and philosophy and process of baking a batch of chocolate chip cookies. I can even study material, research methods and techniques, and even publish books on how to make chocolate chip cookies, but until I smell and eat them, I really have no idea what I’m talking about.

The funny thing is that the language I use, the illustrations I use in my descriptions of making and eating cookies will be the same whether I have experienced the or not.

It’s easy to think you understand he concepts of scarcity and abundance, but until you experience them firsthand, they are two completely different worlds. One objective, looked at from the outside with only an academic understanding, and the other subjective, from the inside, from an experiential feeling of what it’s really like.

One quick test to see if you really have an abundance mindset or a scarcity mindset with regards to money. How do you feel about salespeople? Car salesmen, door-to-door salesmen, time share salesmen? Do you love them or hate them?

If you truly have an abundance mindset towards money, that is if you really feel deep in your bones that money is plentiful, and you will always have an avalanche of money, then you will never feel threatened or put off by salespeople. You will welcome them. You will enjoy talking with them and seeing what they have to offer.

What good is money if you never spend it? If you truly believe that there is an unlimited amount of money in the universe, then you will never feel a lack. And when the salesman comes knocking you will never fear that he or she will con you out of something. You will never feel as if you are getting a raw deal on anything.

Take air for example. Most everybody naturally has a deep, unconscious belief that there is plenty of air in the world. Enough for everybody. We don’t even thinking about worrying about getting enough air to breath when we wake up in the morning. We don’t get into fights with our loved ones over how we are going to be spending our precious air.

If somebody we don’t know walks into the coffee shop we are passing the time in, we don’t suddenly get worried that they will take our precious oxygen. (Of course if they are smoking that is something different altogether).

Likewise with money. Very few people have a true sense of abundance when it comes to money. Sure we all like to proclaim to each other that we have an abundance mindset. We believe in the Law of Attraction. We put down others when they exhibit what we judgingly call “scarcity thinking.”

But when the salesman comes knocking, or we walk into a car dealership, if we are the least bit nervous, or put off, or fearful of our pocketbook, then we are living, breathing and feeling scarcity.

Most people think that once they get plenty of money, then they will stop their scarcity thinking. That is backwards. That is like saying you want to go on a diet, but you are going to lose weight first, then you’ll start to diet and exercise.

That is the great paradox of human nature and how we perceive reality. We spend our childhoods learn the have-do-be mindset. We have something, then we are motivated by our possessions and then it shapes our personality. We are born completely blank, and we have to be given thoughts, ideas, and behaviors, as we grow older. We absorb who we are, how we behave, what we get from the adults around us.

But when we become adults, we must make a shift from the have-do-be mindset to the be-do-have mindset. When we are children we are because of what we have. As adults, we must learn that what we have is a result of what and who we are.

As we grow up, our personalities and behaviors reflect our environment. But as we grow older, we must learn that our environment becomes a reflection of who we are.

The simples test to who you really are on the inside, beneath all the posturing and affirmations and efforts and appearances is to simply look around you. What does your house or apartment look like? Your friends? Your relationships? Your bank account? They won’t change, unless you do.

Change yourself first and your environment will follow. It may take some time, but it will change. Don’t give up.

It’s easy to blame the world. But that is the reaction and thinking style of a child. Children blame the world. Adults take responsibility and change themselves, knowing the environment will change accordingly.

No, it’s not easy. And yes, it can take a lifetime. But what else are we here for except to shape our own reality?

The lady that runs the shop is particularly interesting. I think this was her fourth or fifth business that she has set up. All of her previous businesses were very profitable. What she does is she has an interesting way of identifying food-based niches in small neighborhoods. She figures out what kind of restaurant or food shop would likely be successful based on what other shops are already in the neighborhood, and have already been successful. Then she sets up a shop, generates a lot of loyal customers, and the turns the shop over to one of her assistants in kind of a franchise deal. Her assistant makes half the profits, and she takes half the profits.

She then goes to another neighborhood, and does the same thing. Other that go around and set up businesses based on what they like don’t do as well. For example if somebody only wanted to open up a hamburger shop, sometimes they’d be successful, other times they wouldn’t. Some neighborhoods have a real need for a hamburger shop, while others don’t. Because she is very flexible in her approach, and provides what the market demands, she always seems to make a lot of money.

I remember when I first moved into the dorms in college. We had a party, and snuck a keg of beer into the room. While we were drinking, a friend of mine started telling me about his philosophy professor. He was saying that those that are the most successful in life are the ones that figure out what they want, and then figure out how to mold reality around t heir desires. He said the most important thing is to look underneath want you want to find the underlying desires. Most things that people think they want are really based on an underlying desire, which can be applied to most anything. The mistake many make is trying to fit their surface wants into society, without focusing on their underlying desire.

If you can figure out what your base desire is, you’ll be surprised when you find that almost anything can satisfy it. Which is why we had the party in the first place. And as it turned out, my friend actually did have some left over bread that he could share with me, until we finally go to our destination.

I even remembered what that song was, so I could down load it from iTunes when I got home. I like it when stuff like that happens, don’t you?

How about in your family? Have you ever sat down as a family and discussed what was important to you as a group? Or maybe your Mom or Dad ‘laid down the law’ so to speak. What was important then? Kids doing their homework? Coming home before curfew? A good education?

What about at work? I’m sure you’ve heard or read about or have been involved with creating a ‘mission statement’ for a company at one time or another.

“Our company shall strive to provide real time solutions to emerging problems in a timely manner with respect for the environment and the community.”

“Company XYZ envisions a future where everybody uses XYZ products for the enlightenment of man and the realization of life’s purpose.”

How about this one: “McDonald’s vision is to be the world’s best quick service restaurant experience. Being the best means providing outstanding quality, service, cleanliness and value, so that we make every customer in every restaurant smile.” No kidding.

What about the mission statement for the leaders of your country?

What do you think the three most important values of the entire human race are? Well, let’s have a look, shall we?

One way to look at what’s important is what are the most widely spoken languages in the world today. Perhaps they can give us a clue.

The most spoken language today is Mandarin Chinese, with about a billion speakers. That’s a lot of people. How’d they get so numerous? Well, most of them live in China, so they didn’t invade surrounding countries to spread their language. So one conclusion is that they got to be number one in terms of language spoken by sheer reproductive success and effectiveness. So the most spoken language in the world is spoken by the people that made the most people.

How about the second most spoken language in the world? English. And how did English get to be so popular? Maybe it might have something to do with the fact that up until a couple hundred years ago, “the sun never set on the English empire.” So English, then, was spread around the world because the English themselves spread it around the world. For what purpose? Namely trade. Business. So the second most spoken language in the world was spread because of worldwide interest in commerce.

How about the third most spoken language in the world? Spanish. And who spread the Spanish language? Spain of course. And what was the underlying motivation for Spanish people in the old days roaming the planet and spreading their language? Religion. Generally speaking, first the priests would come, and then the conquistadors.

So there you have it. A quick study in how different languages were spread around the world yields a quick and dirty look into the three most important things that have generally been important to the human race over the last thousand years or so.

Sex.

Money.

God. 

Permalink

Where does money come from? Think of the last ten or twenty dollars you spent.  Where did you get it? Before your wallet, or the ATM. From your job? Where did they get it? From the person that bought whatever it is that your job makes? And where did it come from before that, from THAT person’s job.  And on and on.

From the smallest trinket you buy without the slightest thought to the billion dollar contracts won by huge defense companies, all the money comes from the same place.

YOU.

Your friends, your neighbors, people just like you, make up the economy. It is not something “out there” a danger that you must hide from like a rampaging elephant at a circus gone wrong.  You are part of it. Your spending habits, for better or for worse, contribute to it. If everyone gives in to fear, and doesn’t go out and spend money, guess what will happen? I’m sure that you can understand.  People don’t buy new cars, and car companies don’t make as much money as they planned, so they have to lay people off. And those people don’t spend their money. And with less people working, the government gets less taxes, which means it will be more difficult for them to help people out.

So what’s the answer? Run out spending money like a madman when everybody is wisely being more frugal? No. While that might feel good for a short time, it wouldn’t likely be an effective long term strategy to make things better. Of course we need to be sensible. We need to make sure we protect ourselvesfirst and foremost.  But just as it would be foolish to spend money like there is no tomorrow, many experts believe that it would be equally as foolish to expect some external organization (like the government) to fix something that we erroneously perceive as ”out there.”  Because you can easily understand this, you can realize that as we are part of the economy, we are part of the problem, but more importantly, we are all part of the solution.  And the simplest step you can take is to take responsibility.  We got into this mess by buying things that we couldn’t afford. All of us. That doesn’t mean you should be afraid to spend money. If you can afford something, and you want it or need it, by all means. Buy it. Enjoy it. Share it with others.  Don’t let some imaginary evil monster “out there” scare you. You are smarter than that. You are more experienced than that. 

The biggest danger in thinking there is something “out there” that can be fixed by people “out there” is that you give all your power away.   Don’t let them take it. Keep it for yourself. Because when you realize that you have everything you need, and that money is just a reflection of your skills and ability to contribute, you can’t help but to succeed.

permalink