Everything changes when we give ourselves permission to be more selective in what we choose to do. At once, we hold the key to unlock the next level of achievement in our lives. There is tremendous freedom in learning that we can eliminate the nonessentials, that we are no longer controlled by other people’s agendas, and that we get to choose
– Greg Mckeown
A lesson in financial wellness…
As an Amazon Affiliate it is policy to inform you that this is an advertisement. However, this is still a reflection of a great book that I’ve read many times over. I believe it would benefit any who may read it. You can find the link for it in my references located at the bottom of this page.
As discussed previously, to break free of the slave mindset you will require two things. A talent and a will to live. You must begin with clearing out the junk in your life. You must learn to get by with less. It’s an invaluable life skill and its the first thing you must master on your way to financial literacy. A while ago, I warned against chasing the American dream. That you should chase something better instead. There are many ways to make improvements, but when the average person thinks of “better” they usually believe that means “having more” of something. And that’s true, on occasion. However, “better” typically means “needing less” of something. Today, I plan on helping you figure out how to “better” your life.
Intentional living…
Financial literacy begins with intentional living. Living intentionally can be difficult. That’s why you’re probably not doing it now. Freedom isn’t supposed to be an easy life. There will always be obstacles, but you should be the one choosing the obstacles. I need to get you thinking like an investor now because that will be important in the future. Very few things will be worth your energy and time. You won’t be able to do it all. The only reason you are trying to do everything is because you want to prove to somebody that you aren’t helpless. You need to get over yourself a bit. If you can prioritize, then you are not helpless. Where is your time and energy best spent right now?
When we consider the definition of priority (It means the very first or the most important thing.), it becomes a bit silly to believe that we can have more than one at any given time. Priorities can change, and they should, but if you have more than one priority, then you don’t actually have a priority. And when you do not have a priority, someone else will choose for you. A priority is what makes the difference between going into autopilot and reaching a flow state. On autopilot the destination doesn’t actually matter, and you’ll end up doing something you probably shouldn’t; like wasting your money and time for example. Without a priority you’ll become a collector of useless junk. And eventually you will stagnate.
Prioritizing would also benefit our social lives. It wouldn’t be wise to treat everyone the same. Only a few people would deserve your undivided attention. Many don’t even need to be noticed. Everything has a trade-off. Meaning to have something we want, we would usually have to decline something else we want. Which is why choosing is rarely an easy thing to do. Rebirth usually requires death. We try to fight fear with hope, when we should be fighting with determination. Make your choice before fate decides for you. But this doesn’t mean you rush. Slow down out there. Rushing around will only leave you broke and burnt out. Use your energy to save you time. Use your time to make the most out your energy. If you do this every day, you will eventually build up some decent momentum. Momentum is what generates more money. Rushing will only cost you money. You could do anything, but not everything. Stop putting yourself into situations where you are forced to do something. If you are truly free then act like it. You do what you choose to do. You stick to your priority. You will not be rushed.
One thing at a time…
Working hard will not pay off if you overdo it. Your employers will not blame themselves if you run yourself into the ground. Any contribution you make may stick in their minds for a short while, but eventually they will no longer care. I’m not telling you this to jade you. I’m trying to liberate you. Most of what you’ve done will not matter to most people at the end of your life. This is because very few things in this world can be considered truly valuable. This isn’t nihilism, this is clarity. Without clarity you would be unable to identify a priority even if it slapped you. You will need clarity to improve your situation. You can apply this clarity to your opportunities as well. Perhaps you were given a really great opportunity. More often than not, that opportunity isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. Like a strategist, once you’ve found a good move, look a better one before committing. If that opportunity doesn’t align with your priority, then you will not accept. Always look for your area of maximum effect. You’ll only be able to see it if you are moving at your own pace.
Humans are naturally materialistic. Easily getting caught up in the little things. The little things do not matter. Neither do the big ones really. Most things should be unimportant you, because you are only one person, and you can only handle so much. Only a few things should matter to you. And once you know what those things are, you will reach full maturity. You will only reach this level of clarity once you are junk free. Elegance focuses on what is most important. A simple example is a summarization. Could you thoroughly explain the concept of a book within a few pages? Can you make a complicated issue into a simple matter? You need to be able to see with such clarity that you can see what is missing. Focusing on what is important will save you money. You will be able to put more money toward what matters. It will also keep you out of trouble and keep you vigilant of scams and bad investments.
The reason you don’t have as much money as you should is because you are trying to do too much. There is no strategy without a priority. Any success you find without a strategy would be by sheer luck. And it wouldn’t last. You can do anything, but not everything. And to do anything well will require sacrifices. You can’t have it all and you shouldn’t try. Once you’ve reached this level of clarity, your entire life changes. It’s akin to a drug addict reaching sobriety. You would remember how to choose your own path. To improve your decision power, you must become more selective. You should only settle for “good enough” in the case of an emergency. Everything has its trade-off which is why nothing in this world will be perfect for you, but you can still discern what is best for you. Opportunities will come at you randomly, really good opportunities too. Some of the opportunities will be so good that you would feel like some kind of idiot for refusing. You must never give in to the fear of missing out. If you say yes to what is “really good” for you, you will miss out on what is best for you.
You need time to think. You will not always be ready for the day’s challenges. Being unavailable can come with certain perks. To become limitless you must make your own space. You must improve your focus to strengthen the power of your decisions. You need the time to explore your options. That requires slowing down; stopping, if you have to. Taking a step back. Racing around will only add more things to your list. To go from one thing to the next endlessly will only wear yourself down. To always be available will eventually paint you into a corner. Yes, to be efficient means to get the most done, but that doesn’t mean doing the most. It means getting your priorities straight. A great mind values time and space above all else. There is no other way to reach the level of focus you would need to make a great change. I want you to look at boredom as having time to think. I want you to use that time more efficiently. I want you to be more in control of yourself. But what do you want?
Say no more often…
Creating space for yourself is simple. All you have to do is say “no” more often. No, as it turns out, is quite a powerful word. It’s a complete sentence by itself. It could stop a lot of stupid shit from happening to you. It would keep the money in your pocket for a bit longer, and it would keep you free of obligations. The word “no” is so powerful that it could change your life. A yes from you should never be earned. You will only say yes to what you need at the time. Do not allow yourself to be spread thin. Saying no more often will make you MORE effective over time; not less.
If you have a problem saying no, it’s probably not because you are afraid of confrontation, perhaps you are simply afraid of change. You are afraid of something, and that is for certain. This is one of those times where hatred would come in handy. Hatred of poverty will give you the energy you need to make those crucial changes. It worked for me. To give you a little encouragement, being pressured into saying yes is basically the definition of conformity. Weakness. Acquiescence. A relinquishing of your power. Personally, I’ve regretted the times I’ve said yes more often than the times I’ve declined. Once I realized that, I got over my fear of missing out. No is a powerful word. If you don’t have a problem saying no, then you are powerful.
You don’t have to get standoffish to say no. There are plenty of unscathing ways to reject someone. You could remain silent for a few seconds, you could make a counteroffer, you could say “let me get back to you on that,” you could make yourself unavailable, you could clarify your priorities, you could make a lesser commitment, or you could set them up with somebody else. Hell, you could even be funny about it. For example, “nope,” “hell naw,” “you wish,” you could even go with my personal favorite: “suck my dick.” Sure, saying no more often will make you less popular, but what you lose in popularity you would gain in respect. You should only get standoffish once your boundaries have been encroached. Without boundaries you become someone else’s tool. Not a rewarding life. You would lose your ability to choose for yourself. You can only set these boundaries by clarifying what you will not do; by refusing anything that doesn’t align with your priorities. From your priorities comes the courage to be disliked. Boundaries would also clarify what is a “you problem” and what isn’t. Sometimes the best thing you can do for someone is let them suffer. Who do you think you are anyway? Some kind of hero? For the sake of your bank account, I’m going to need you to hang up that cape, captain.
Another reason we say yes is because we simply had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. We accidentally overextend. But that doesn’t mean we have to remain stuck. A master knows how to make their own exit instead of remaining trapped and waiting to be dismissed. Sure, going back on your word is dishonorable, but dishonor has fewer consequences than damning yourself. We have to be realistic about these things. We can avoid either scenario by being more selective about which contracts we accept and saying no more often. Commitments are usually bad for your bank account, and the harder we commit, the harder it is to let go. Uncommitting goes against our conditioning. Most of us have been taught by our parents that wastage is a bad thing, and this is true. But if you are shortsighted this lesson will become a bias that clouds your judgment. It’s called the “sunken cost bias.” By continuing to invest in a liability, you would cause more wastage for yourself than if you had simply cut your losses. You need to put your mistakes where they belong. In the past.
Cut you liabilties…
Your liabilities are holding you back. Liabilities do more than cost you money. They waste your energy and time as well. They keep you shackled and weighed down. They get in your way. They could even get you hurt. We take on liabilities for two reasons primarily. We overvalue what they are actually worth to us, and we try to do too much. A priority is a choice that will settle all of your other choices. Most importantly, you’ll know when to stop. You’ll know exactly what sort of progress you’d like to see. Another way you could approach cutting your liabilities is to think like an editor. Most editors take away more than they add. Imagine your life as a book or a movie. If there’s too much going on in your story it’s going to suck. Kind of like what’s happening to the Marvel cinematic universe. The MCU wouldn’t be such a dumpster fire today if they had simply told less stories, condensed the stories that remained, and focused on getting those stories as close to perfect as they could. But instead, they went quantity over quality. “Less is more” isn’t just a rule of storytelling, it’s also the difference between surviving and thriving.
Cutting liabilities will ultimately save you money, but you must take it even further. You need to learn how to make your supplies last. For example, take a look at how much food you consume. Do you have to eat until you are stuffed? How long do your leftovers last? Are you using your freezer wisely? You must be proactive, so you won’t be forced to be reactive. Even if you do everything right, you’ll never know when hard times will come. Mistakes will be made. Accidents happen. A contingency can only be obtained through rationing. You’ll know you’ve gotten better at making things last once you have a stack of money. To get by with less, you must require less. You must be able to do more with less. This requires understanding your limits. Your limits usually boils down to your time constraints and your skillset. This is bigger than money. This is about becoming more efficient. Having more money is simply a welcomed side-effect of your newfound discipline. Bettering your life will require living by design. Living intentionally. Are your days productive? Or are they just busy?
Cutting a liability will be a wasted effort if you do not reorganize afterward. Disorganization is the primary cause of your financial problems in the first place. As a morbid example, imagine being shot with an arrow. Yes, the arrow must be removed, but if you fail to patch yourself up directly after, you will eventually bleed out. To avoid hemorrhaging money, you must move with the same sense of urgency. After cutting a loss and reorganizing, it is best to start small. Rome wasn’t built in a day after all. In the past I brought up the importance of having a regimen. There is nothing more boring than a routine. However, most boring activities end up working wonders for your bank account. Without a routine you’ll wander aimlessly and eventually find some excuse to blow your money.
If you want to call yourself an investor, then you must first complete the ordeal: investing in yourself. This isn’t just about reading the books or lifting the weights or saving the money. It’s also about getting the sleep. A lack of sleep will screw your brain up worse than hunger or being sick. And worse, a lack of sleep can accumulate over time to become a major health issue. You can’t afford to have your brain functioning any less than full capacity; not if you are actually trying to make progress. It would be impossible to learn a new skill. Imagine training your body to its limits every single day. Eventually your body would break down due to overtraining. That’s exactly what you do to your brain when you don’t get enough sleep. Your time isn’t yours until you can consistently get a full night’s sleep. Improving your sleep will also save you money. You can’t spend money in your sleep after all. It would cut back on the type of mistakes that could’ve been avoided. You will maintain your ability to prioritize. If you aren’t sleeping the way you should, then YOU become your biggest liability. Our natural healing factor depends on sleep. Your muscles repair themselves, and your brain will have the time to make new neural connections. Think of sleep as allocating your newly acquired stat points. Without rest, you aren’t actually getting any better.
Elegance…
To find a way to change your situation, you must explore. To properly explore, you must stop rushing around and trying to keep up with everyone. There is no such thing as a high-speed exploration. If you have given your priority as much time as it required, then you should have plenty of time left in the day to explore. If not, then your new priority should be finding more time for yourself. If you have a creative spirit, finding more space and time becomes imperative. The artistic process involves wrestling with an idea until you’ve polished your initial vision. You can’t do that while cooped up and playing video games. Recently, we’ve learned that games can be used to teach you anything. Games can be a powerful learning tool. Someone with the wrong idea could use games to condition you. Playing the wrong game will teach you nothing of importance. There are plenty of garbage games out there that will destroy your mind, but games will always have a necessary part in the learning process. It is how tacit knowledge is acquired. Without creativity, knowledge will not stick. Play is the highest form of research. Without entertainment, life will get stagnant very quickly. We would start falling back into bad habits. We would try to ease the suffering by blowing our money on cheap thrills and shiny junk. With our lack of imagination, we would require too much. So, you need to start playing your own games. It’s not hard. We used to do it all the time as children. Imagine your inner child and how much fun they would get out of a toy sword. I bet that kid would get into all sorts of hijinks. I also bet that kid would learn something important from their misadventures. While learning something important in your current life, look for that toy sword.
To wrap things up, I have an exercise for you. Clean out your closet and reorganize it. Take everything out and go through everything you have one by one. Don’t just make a “keep pile.” Only keep the stuff you absolutely must have. Take a look at whatever you find and ask yourself, “would I buy this if I didn’t, have it?” If the answer is no, then toss it out. You don’t have to throw all of it away, only what you cannot sell, donate, or give as a gift. This will show you whether or not you have what it takes to cut a liability. Living intentionally isn’t just about saving money and time. It’s also about showing gratitude for the good things in your life and slowing down to enjoy the moment. Intentional living can only be done in the present. If your mind is dwelling on the past or dreading the future, your priorities will become lost in the fog. You would be essentially wasting your days. Next thing you know, 10 years will pass and you would still be caught up in the same old patterns. Then the regrets start piling up. It’s time to start taking control. Cut the liabilities. Your new life awaits.
References and photos
Essentialism– Greg Mcheown
Persona 5- Altus
Jujutsu kaisen- Gege Akutami
Frozen- Disney Studios