Category: Thoughts

I had a great conversation today with my wife. We were laying down to go to sleep after she finished a bit of a rough day. Many people in her family have dealt with depression issues and she was also reacting after her family had some very negative news about a close family friend being diagnosed with brain cancer and only have a short time to live.

Our conversation went as follows and I’m writing it down because it was very meaningful, so hopefully it could potentially positively impact anyone else who is reading this. Plus my wife made a promise to me, so I want to document this promise in written word.

ME: Lets find a cheat code to you being happy, are their any little things that you can do throughout a day that you know make you happy? And if not “happy” then at least little things that can by themselves start to turn a day around? I’ve written bout this before in my Simple Joys post. She decided to think over the next day and to write down any ideas that came to her head.

At the end of the day she didn’t really have any ideas written down so we sat down and talked it through, and luckily we were able to think of one together! To respect her privacy I wont share the idea, but it was very meaningful to her and something that she decided would turn any potential bad day around; and instantly give her a happy thought that she could focus on for the rest of the day. It was perfect, and I got so happy for her that she now had this little cheat code she could access anytime she felt like it! Anyway back to our conversation:

I asked her to promise me, out loud that she would try to use this cheat code anytime she was down. In addition to that, I asked that she promise me that she would figure out a way to find the positive side of things life throws at her, or at least some type of positive take away. ** If it was some kind of adversity she could use that as motivation to work harder, or if it was in fact actual good news she would bask in that good news and celebrate it without thinking beyond the current good news and focusing on any aspect of the situation that could go wrong in the future. A big part of her ability to make me this promise was that there is no timetable on when she will achieve this ability to see aspects of everything positively. But she did more than just commit to “trying” to do it. She acknowledged that she is in control of her thoughts and emotions, she will achieve her goal some day, but there is no rush. Everyone works at different speeds and in different ways. Its important to note there is a fine line between admitting there are circumstances beyond our control, and committing to the idea that we react to every situation in our own heads, we control the narrative and the impact any situation has on our own lives. Even in the case of loosing a loved one, we can choose to focus on all of the positive memories that we had with that person, and the positive affects they had on our life, which have stayed with us long beyond the absence of their physical presence.

And on the lighter side, I also got my wife to admit that there really is no point in wasting her energy on being down or sad/upset for too long because I will always be there with my relentless positivity to force happyness and fun on both of us because I am her husband & I am a happy person. ** I will drag her into happiness if/when I ever have to 🙂 It is way more fun to be happy, and to spend mental energy focusing on what could go right instead of what could go wrong. Most things in life have way better odds than 50-50 of going well or at least being somewhat close to how we want them too. And hell even at 50-50 you still have a coin flip of things going well, you can just as easily spend the vast majority of your time focused on the good/fun parts, and then in the off chance that a negative situation does roll your way just pause, soak up the feeling, ask yourself if this negative result was because of a past decision you made. If it was, identify how you could choose better in the future if this situation or anything similar comes your way. If it wasn’t something in your control, accept that life has a certain level of unpredictability. At the end of the day sometimes the chips don’t fall the way you want them to, and things beyond our control are the cause. In those very rare cases the only thing you can do is tip your cap to the universe, and then wake up the next day and be thankful you are still hear to enjoy another day 🙂

**Everything within reason, a loved one being diagnosed with a fatal illness does not qualify, we can all be down about that for a period of time.

**I declare that in public to my friends as a defacto social contract and a sudo self filling proficiency. Everyone expects me to be happy anywhere I go, I usually am by default happy every day and everywhere I go so in the rare case that I’m not and I have a social occasion to attend my mind almost goes on auto pilot and switches gears to being happy since that is my routine, that is what I, and everyone else expect :).

In the current hyper polarized environment we all find ourselves inhabiting it is very hard to figure out where I can fit in with our current 2 party political system:

I love our country. I’m proud to be American. If I’m traveling overseas and someone asks where I’m from I say the USA, or Missouri. I would never dream of saying Canada to “feel safer”. I don’t disagree that the US has tons of problems, every single country has problems. Every society that has ever existed has problems.

I love civil liberties and freedom to be yourself. I hate racists, and people who try to force their way of life on other people (but I hate it both ways equally) I don’t agree with people who try and tell other people that they can’t marry the person they love, or they can’t do whatever they want with their own body. And I dislike people who tell other people that they can’t enjoy masculine activities like hunting, or fighting, or playing sports, or simply being a white man. I dislike people who generically vilify white people.

I love Hockey, Baseball, Golf, and I enjoy casually watching the UFC. Violence is not inherently bad when both parties agree to it (IE within the rules of a sport). Trying to smash out violence and masculine behavior from all boys is just another form of forcing people to live the way you want them too.

I hate people who treat women poorly, who take advantage of a drunk girl at a party, or put a girl down for the way she looks, or pay a women less for doing the same job as a man. These ideas and people all need to be eliminated from our society. Well the people can be allowed to change before we eliminate them haha

I like people who try and bring everyone around them up. Who compliment people when they work hard. Who don’t spend much, if any, time complaining or worrying about how other people live.

I like people who work hard and who don’t cast the blame towards “the system” or towards other people to explain their lack of a good life. Life is hard, we all individually have so much control over the good and bad in our own lives, and that is very scary for all of us.

I don’t like people who refuse to acknowledge that minorities get the shaft and they have to work even harder to succeed. This is not right, this needs to change. I don’t know how this can change. I don’t know how to walk the line of encouraging others to take ownership of their lives and go out and get whatever it is they want, while also acknowledging if they are a minority it will be harder for them. I feel that the current discourse is drifting farther and farther away from personal responsibility and into asking the government or someone else to provide for everyone. If you are born poor and a minority there is no doubt it will be harder for you to succeed. But many people have done it, there are examples out there for you. It’s not fair at all, many times in our lives we will come across things that are not fair, or rules that are not fair. There is only one thing to do, figure out a way around, over, under or above whatever the obstacle is. Keep pushing, keep moving forward. We can all make our own lives, and the lives of everyone we love better every day. We don’t need help from anyone else (although if help ever does come that would be a great bonus!)

I hate the idea of socialism. The government does not do very many things well, and I don’t want them to be in charge of more things. I would prefer they be in charge of less. A perfect example is the police.

I don’t hate the police, but I don’t think our current system is good and it should be completely rebuilt. Cops should not aimlessly wander around the streets harassing minorities. We should end the war on drugs. We should have community organized policing. We should have many different types of cops with different specialties instead of only 1 type that carry 1 tool (guns) and are forced to use it to try and solve a wide range of issues.

We should stop trying to abolish the 2nd amendment, people have a right to have guns to protect ourselves from our own government. In the age of Donald Trump its not too far fetched to see that even us here in the US we are not all that far away from a dictator being able to throw our 200 year old government aside.

That is just a few thoughts that came into my head and I needed to get them down so that they are out and gone from my head but not lost. I might come back and add more to this later.

As the events of the past few weeks have unfolded I’ve found myself increasingly shocked.  Shocked at the way police officers are treating protesters and shocked at the level of deep seeded anger that many of the protesters have.  Watching videos like this one (https://twitter.com/chimdesires/status/1267198829775990787?s=19 ) I just don’t even understand what is happening.  Almost any ordinary white person you show that video too will have this as the first thought (my god that is horrible….. I wonder what those two did before that video started that made the police so angry). In fact for reference here is an exact quote from one of my very close friends. I sent him the link to that video, and he replied:

Just watched the one with the cops pulling people out of the car. Makes me wonder why they did that. I mean it cant be like a random thing right? Like there was surly a reason, not just pulling some randos out of a car kinda like the editing made it seem…

 It makes sense, most of us have never had a bad interaction with a cop in our life.  They are the people you call when you need help.  We (white people) are taught since childhood that cops are good, and honest.  We should respect them.  Almost every interaction I’ve had with a cop has been very pleasant. This is (hopefully) true about many cops but as I become an adult I can see that it is not a universal truth.  It’s possible the people in this video did something to provoke the cops, but what on earth would be bad enough to provoke that type of response?  Their car windows are bashed in, both front tires slit. The woman is pepper sprayed.  The main is tazed and then the cops yell at him to get his hands up while he is writhing around from the tazer shot.  Once they do get the man out of the car they beat him with a club.  What on earth could possibly warrant that type of response? And finally, what if they did nothing at all? What if they were just driving through, like the two White people in the car in front of them were, and the cops did that for basically no reason.  If you are a White person reading this think about that. 

/—Update —

The full police video has been released. The people basically did nothing to cause the treatment they received by the cops. The cop reactions is quite literally, complete insane. Full Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdOYCr3kQy4&feature=youtu.be

—/

I also realized, I think, why I have been so surprised.  I don’t have any close black friends in my life, and I don’t think I’m the exception for most white people living in the Midwest. I’m just a simple guy from Missouri.  I’ve always felt that I was not the least bit racist, I’ve been uncomfortable in so many situations when people I know or random people at a party make mildly racist jokes, but I’ve really never done anything about it other than just quietly fake laugh along with the crowd. I haven’t had a truly close black friend since freshmen year of high school.  Growing up, one of my best friends and the first guy I meet in our neighborhood, was black.  But guess what, they were the only black family in our neighborhood.  It just so happened that when I moved there at the age of eight, his family were also one of the first families’ to move into the neighborhood which was under construction.  I have so many great memories of spending time at their house, eating dinner with their family.  Riding bikes with Dale.  Some of my most vivid memories from that time span in my life (~age 8 – 15) was watching mike Tyson fights at Dales house.  His mom LOVED Iron Mike, and she didn’t care that we were two young kids watching brutal knock outs, it was awesome! Around the age of 15 though Dale started getting into drugs.  Drugs took Dale’s life on a quick downward spiral and he ultimately overdosed.  I remember seeing his dad for the first time after Dale’s death; I’ll never forget how sad his face looked.

Really though telling this story of my friendship with Dale is the only experience I have.  I have never had a close black friend since then.  That was 16 years ago.  I don’t see any quick way to improve our current situation.  We can’t realistically identify and fire all of the bad cops.  We can’t change the policing polices at the drop of a hat, that seems like it will take at least a generation.  I also don’t see any good or inspiring candidates running to lead our local communities and country out of this horrible situation.  On the presidential front the only good person I can see in close proximity is Michelle Obama, but she is not actually running and it’s understandable if she doesn’t want to put her family through another eight years of presidency.

So the only useful thought I have about a way to at least start to improve our current situation is that ordinary white people like me need to make an effort to have black friends; and by this experience we can learn and build compassion and understanding for a cause we had the privilege of previously ignoring. If ordinary white people like me actually get close enough to ordinary black people maybe we will understand and emphasize with their problems much better.  Maybe we would actually believe them when they say cops attack them for no reason.  Maybe together we could figure out how to fix some things.

So with that in mind I’m going to set a goal, a simple and modest goal.  I’d like to make one close black friend before 2020 is over.  That’s it, nothing fancy about it.  I’d like to make a friend, have good times with them, and learn from them.

I had a new  thought about a way to reach financial freedom.  What if instead of trying to save up for one large lump sum, mythical “retirement” you just start saving up to cover all of your monthly fees, starting with the smallest fee first.  For example, if you took a Netflix subscription of $8.99.  (also kinda silly because you should absolutely be splitting Netflix with a friend or relative).  If you want to pay the full list $8.99/month all you would need to do is open a stock market investing account and put enough in the account to cover the yearly cost of this subscription service.  You can keep it simple by just starting a Vanguard account and buying a total stock market fund like VTSAX.  Once you open your account if you add $2,450  into it that will cover your netflix subscription for life (8.99/month = 96 dollars per year.  2,450 x .04 = 98 dollars per year).  You can adjust the formula to whatever % return you would like, but the benefits of this paradigm shift in the thought process about retirement seem immense:

• Suddenly the monthly cost of every service, bill, or activity you have will be very well tracked, understood, and ultimately shrunk because doing so directly affects your ability to make incremental progress toward your goal.  Additionally when you appreciate the monthly cost of everything you  start to make better decisions about purchases.
• It’s incredibly motivating to make incremental progress.  It’s why almost every majorly successful game allows the player to make incremental progress.  Imagine if all of us could visualize our development the same way it shows up on our character’s when playing a game like the Sims or Zelda.  We get to see our characters attributes grow, it’s addicting, it’s why game companies make games this way.  It’s why you can spend time playing a game making your virtual character better at reading, weight lifting, or shooting without just making your real life self-better.   Or if gaming isn’t your thing; enjoying watching John Snow move towards claiming the Iron Throne, or reading about Harry Potter developing his skills as a wizard, and inching closer to his date with destiny through a confrontation with Lord Voldormort..  All of these things have a commonality that you can pretty much watch the characters grow and make incremental progress towards some sort of goal.  Incremental progress feeds something for us at an almost biological level.  If you can use this tool that we all, or most of us, seem to possess it will make the journey towards financial freedom much easier, and much more likely to be successful
• As your investments grow to cover each and every one of your monthly expenses you will get a sense of overwhelming relaxation and freedom.  You will enjoy the activity/subscription/service/product fully knowing this is now a part of your lifestyle that is totally paid for.  Along the way, after each milestone, you can look at your string of accomplishments and see how much you have been “leveling up” your  life.
• Ultimately, once you make it to the level of being able to cover all of your monthly expenses with your chosen % return amount you will literally be free to do whatever you desire.  Keep working at the same job, why not if you are having fun! Continuing traveling full-time,  why not, your expenses will always be covered!  But the real magic in this plan is if you realized somewhere along your journey that you actually don’t even want to “retire”, that you get a large amount of  purpose and sense of self-worth from whatever job that you do. You can decide to stop short of covering 100% of your expenses knowing that you don’t want to quit your job. 

The best approach would probably be to just throttle back and aim to cover 100% of your expenses in say 5 – 10 year increments, because things can change.  Maybe you are working at a company that you started and absolutely love right now, but in 5 or 10 years you might burned out and ready to make a change.  Or maybe you are currently a firefighter and love being part of a team environment + literally saving peoples lives.  It’s completely fine if you derive a lot of your self-worth from your profession. However, ultimately we will all be happier if we could derive a sense of self-worth internally, that doesn’t rely on any external inputs; but this is a lot easier said than done .  What we do and what happens in the world around us influences the internal dialog we have in our head about the type of person we are and the type of life we live.  It’s fine to strive for the ability to not let external factors affect you, but it’s also okay to never make it all the way there, and to let some external factors control some amount of your happiness and sense of self-worth. After all, some external things like losing a child, or a spouse, can never be fully removed from our daily lives after they happen.  Those will be a part of you forever, like a stone that you carry around with you in your pocket.  At first it may seem huge and heavy –  more like a boulder you’re trying to get out from under – but that eventually, with time and story-telling about the person, sharing their memory with others (even people who didn’t know them) the boulder is worn down and smoothed into a rock and then a stone small enough to fit in your pocket.  

So with this overall thought process in mind, it appears to me that methodically saving up enough money to cover your monthly expenses little by little,  and documenting the journey along the way will make a dramatically positive effect on the trajectory of your life. You will have the freedom to be present for many of life’s milestones, and will enjoy the benefit of the natural desire to make incremental progress throughout one’s life. These effects will be more powerful the younger you are when you start a stock market investment account & start contributing money to cover you lifes monthly expenses.