Healthy Wealth & Wise

As a child mom, dad, grandma & grandpa said that what they wanted out of life was to be HEALTHY – WEALTHY and WISE.  I agree, and I’m sure most people would.  This leads to three questions:  Why don’t most people end up with these things?  Is this difficult?  Is it possible? 

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Gaining Wisdom – Wisdom comes in many ways, but most people become wise through their life experiences.  Truly smart and successful people are able to “stand on the shoulders of giants” to learn from others.  Truly smart people are able to utilize the experiences of others through reading, listening and mentoring with those who are wiser than they are. In order to become wise, a person needs to have a desire to gain wisdom.  Not everyone has that desire. Some people are not much wiser at the age of 50 than they were at the age of 16 - - how sad.  Anyone who wishes to can change this, but most people will fail to do so.

Being Healthier – We would all like to be HEALTHY.  Unfortunately many people do the very things that we know lead us away from having good health.  Our politicians and media seem to focus on health care and health insurance as the problem.  The question often is asked, (rhetorically) “How can a country with our wealth and with the world’s best health care system be among the sickest in the world?”  The answer to the question is not to be found within the framework of the question itself.  True, we do have the best health care system in the world. True we are among the wealthiest countries in the world.  The problem we have with our country’s health is that we eat too much food with too little nutritional value.  People who are well nourished won’t find themselves constantly hungry and eating foods that are high in calories and low in nutritional value.  In order to improve our countries health, we need to first improve our health.  To improve our health a first big step is to improve our diet.  Not necessarily focusing on eating less, but eating more nutritionally.  As a country and as individuals, we seem unwilling to do so.  The second step to improving our health is to get away from our sedentary life style and become more physically active.  For more information on proper nutrition, see this link Weight control therapy.  Many of us are unwilling to purposefully be healthy.

For the most part, Wisdom and Health are quite simple to attain. Not easy, but surely simple.

How about wealth?

True Wealth – Most likely everyone wants to have some measure of WEALTH.  Well we do have some measure of wealth, but most likely not the measure we want.  I’m pretty sure most of us want to lead “the good life”, but the reality is that most Americans are living paycheck to paycheck.  The vast majority of Americans end up living relatively average, middle-class lives. We are among the most educated people in the world.  We live in the country with more wealth than any place in the world, yet most people – well educated people – find themselves in dire straits regarding their personal wealth.  WHY?!?!  The problem is that seldom are we taught HOW to create and live a great life.  We study all sorts of things in school that are essentially useless when it comes to creating wealth.  Schools were created in America to develop a better work force.  To that end, our public education has done a very good job.  We have the best workers in the world, but that will seldom lead to the wealth needed to lead “the good life”.  Without a basic formula for financial success, we are doomed to no better than normal results.  In the words of Dave Ramsey, “Normal is broke!”

There are few paths to true wealth.  First of all I’ll discuss the confusion between richness and wealth. Richness is measured in dollars, whereas wealth is measured in time.  Few people can stop working and continue to survive financially for very long.  This is due to lack of knowledge for some, lack of follow-through for others.  The lack of knowledge is a product of our educational system today.  The only thing taught in most schools in our country is a way to earn an income actively.  This is merely a trade of time for money.  The thing few schools have taught and consequently few people know about is a method of creating what is called a passive income stream.  With a passive income time is invested rather than traded.  Once time is spent, you can never benefit from it again – just like money.  Time that is invested can benefit you in the future – just like money that is invested.

Here’s a neat little excerpt I saw that I want to share.  It shows two formulas.  One is for success and one is for chaos.

The first is the formula for chaos, which goes like this:

     Impulse  +  Opportunity  =  Chaos

Every day, each of us have impulses.  We have impulses to study or to spend, to do our work or to watch television. Impulses are merely ideas that pop into our minds and momentarily catch our attention. Impulsive people don’t put much thought into their impulses; they merely follow through with them and therein lies the problem.  The problem is that impulses are relatively random and too many are based on casual appetites or fleeting temptations.  Too many impulses are based in the idea of finding or doing things that are pleasurable, instead of finding or doing things that will truly make us happy.  There's nothing inherently bad or wrong with our impulses, but there is nothing inherently good or trustworthy about them, either.

The problem comes at the point in time when our impulses are made possible by opportunity.  For instance how many people have wanted a big screen TV, a vacation, a bigger car, etc and found a way to get it is to use a credit card or a home equity loan to do so?  The answer is TOO MANY OF US!  The reason we do it is Impulse was met with Opportunity.  Along with that how many lending institutions tell us that “we deserve it”.  We are fed with the idea that if we can borrow money for it, then we can afford it.  That doesn’t work for individuals and we’re finding out that it doesn’t work for countries.

Take the impulse to the next logical level.  You like to watch TV, so commercials convince you that you need/deserve a new big screen TV.  Combine that with available credit to let you go out and purchase a new TV.  What is the end result?  More time is wasted by sitting in front of TV more often.  Impulses happen to all of us and there’s nothing wrong with that.  When impulses meet opportunity and we reward ourselves with instant gratification all of the sudden we can find our life going out of control.

Now, consider a similar formula for achievement:

     Desire  +  Discipline  =  Achievement

We all have desires, just like impulses and there’s nothing wrong with either. What we do about them is very important however.  "Desire" comes from Latin words that mean "of the father”.  Our deepest desires represent our true longings, our mission or purpose in life. When we are clear about our real DESIRES and combine them with an orderly and disciplined life, the results can be astonishing! 

Impulses are to Desires as Pleasure are to Happiness.   A drug addict may gain pleasure, but does that truly bring them happiness?  A new car (or TV) may be something you get an impulse to buy, but is it something that you truly desire?   In order to gain true happiness, we have to find then pursue our true desires.  At the same time, in order to gain true happiness by pursuing our true desires, we must fight our impulses to quench our thirst for pleasure.

Those who have done anything significant in their life have had a deep desire before they found success.  Jonas Salk had the DESIRE to prevent polio and the DISCIPLINE to do the research, study his notes and make the discoveries. The results changed the world.  Mary Kay Ash had the DESIRE to help single moms like herself, and the DISCIPLINE to find a way. She had no money (she started with $500) and no business experience, but she pressed forward. She changed an industry and helped millions of women to become wealthy in the process.

Random impulses in a personal environment filled with opportunities for instant gratification too often lead to chaos, debt, and disaster. If you look carefully our country is filled with stories of people who have deep financial hardships because they followed their impulses into chaos.

Knowing your deepest DESIRES and matching them with even minimal DISCIPLINE, however, is the recipe for achievement. When Stephen Covey talks about "starting with the end in mind," he's talking about being clear about your deepest desires. When we talk about written goals, we're talking about strong desires. When you know what you truly want, and go after it with discipline and determination, the results are astounding.

Robert Kiyosaki lists three key for success: 

Long term vision – Delayed gratification – The power of compounding.

I believe this follows very closely with the formula for achievement laid out above.  We can all pursue three items this began with if we want to badly enough.  True desire, coupled with knowledge and discipline can help us all to be HEALTHY – WEALTHY – and WISE.