In my last post, I discussed the first of a couple of principles that will aid you in the process of becoming rich. The second is like it, and is best described in Heinlein's book, The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress. The principle is known as "TANSTAAFL", said as one oddly-pronounced word. It is an acronym that stands for "There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch."
What does this mean for the person who is becoming rich? Simply this: Aside from a very few insanely lucky people, it will not happen quickly, and it will not happen without effort. Get-quick-rich schemes either depend on such vanishing statistical chance that they cannot in any way be depended upon, or require of you a price that you may not realize that you are about to pay.
I was tempted by offers of a $1,000 or even $2,000 shopping spree at a national electronics chain. All I had to do was to sign up for a certain number of free or almost-free offers. It was easy money, wasn't it? Not necessarily. I knew from the experiences of others that you would have to remember, personally, to cancel the various offers before you had anywhere from nine to fifteen companies charging you $10-20/month for their services. Actually getting these offers canceled is often a real pain, because many of these companies are less than scrupulous. They will take up your time trying to convince you to stay, and then mysteriously lose your cancellation paperwork to get everything out of you that they can. These offers also often involve you signing away the right for them to sell your information to other companies. One of these shopping sprees can result in a huge overflow of junk mail for years to come.
In other words, the price for the offer was my privacy, along with a great deal of time and energy that in retrospect would be more burdensome than simply finding a job that paid $20/hr and working full-time for about a week and a half. TANSTAAFL.
I have a third principle, and liberals will not want to believe this one, because it undercuts their preferred form of aid to the poor. The principle is this: Spend the money that you earned. Earn the money that you spend. This will aid you greatly in becoming rich.
When people do manage to 'hit the jackpot' and become rich quick, it is almost always temporary. Give them a few weeks to a few years, depending on the dollar amount, and they will be just as poor as before. I have heard it said that if wealth was collected and distributed utterly equally, both property and money, within a generation all the wealth would be back where it was. Why is this?
Human beings value things based on the cost to acquire them. When your riches come to you by your own efforts, you are more likely to be careful with them. If you spent five hours digging ditches to get your check, you are less likely to toss it away on frivolities. Money in and of itself has no value. It's cotton and linen and dyes. The number stamped on it is more or less an arbitrary marking. The reason why it has value to you is because it represents those hours of sweat and aches, and it can be exchanged for a good meal and soft, safe place to sleep.
When people receive money through no effort of their own, through winning a huge prize or being handed it readily by faceless government officials, the money does not represent their hard work. It does not represent hours spent out in the sun, or days of frustrating problem-solving. It has little or no value, and the riches they purchase also mean little to them. What if your television breaks? Buy another! Break it out of pique and buy another! It cost you no effort. It cost you no pain, no determination, no struggle.
Now there are exceptions. Some people who win the lottery do manage their money wisely. Some people who receive aid do invest and use it wisely. By the great majority, however, you should not wish for instant riches if you want to become rich. You should wish instead for the slow and steady path, for the accumulation over years, for the knowledge that every time you are knocked down, you can get back up and start again on the path to becoming rich. Becoming rich, like aging fine wine, is more about the process than the result.
My own family is following this path.We have had downturns and upturns, but over all we are on a slow but steady path to the Middle Class. We take care of the things we own, because they cost us dearly in time and effort to accumulate. We save when we can, spend when we must, and reduce where we can. I used to think that it would be wonderful to win the lottery or suddenly have our mortgage debt randomly forgiven. Now I am beginning to see that such 'blessings' may turn out to be a curse. When we have won our way, we will do so by our own efforts, with our own skills, and our wealth will mean something to us.
May it be for everyone. Then everyone can become truly rich.
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