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You ever wish you could go back and change the past? Just turn back time, as impossible as it may seem.
Maybe you wish you would have handled yourself better in a dispute with your then significant other, now ex. Maybe you wish you invested in Bitcoin back in 2010. Maybe you wish you were a bit more social during high school. Or perhaps you wish you spent more time talking to your grandma before she passed. Whatever the case may be, there are definitely some decisions you made that you aren’t too proud of, to say the least. There are opportunities you skipped out on, chances missed. You made mistakes. You fucked up. And you wish you could go back and do it all again. Do it right. This time. But you can’t go back. You don’t fly a TARDIS, nor drive a DeLorean, nor own a Time Turner in your jewelry box. You’re pretty much stuck with whatever circumstances you find yourself in, in the present. There’s no going back. Your life ain’t a VHS tape that you can just rewind. And that feeling of longing for a change in events that already happened lingers on for weeks, months, and even years later after it all took place. You know better now. You wouldn’t make the same decisions that you did back then. You would do something else. Something different. Something better. It’s regret you feel. Regret that haunts you for a seemingly eternal timeline. And man, let me tell you, regret is real and something we all face. We all look back in the past of our own lives at some point and think to ourselves “coulda, shoulda, woulda.” “I coulda done this. I shoulda done that. Then that woulda made something different happen” -- is the general thought process behind regretting the past. We can become so easily fixated on what things *would* look like now *if only* you did things a little bit different in the past. If only, if only. It’s so easy to trap yourself in the void of “if onlys”. If only I said this. If only I did that. Yet, through all these couldas, shouldas, wouldas, and if onlys, what we fail to realize, what we remain oblivious to is that the things we do today will be tomorrow’s past. We can’t change the past that’s already gone, but we can change the past of the future, because today is tomorrow’s past and tomorrow is the future’s present. In other words, while you can’t go back and fix what previous events in your life, you can change what you’re doing *right now* in the present to directly have an impact on the future (and hopefully create a better tomorrow). We’re gonna take a look at how to relax and take it easy in life, enjoy the moment in the present, rather than swallow yourself up in regret in today’s blog. I promise you won’t regret reading it. And without further ado let’s dive...right into it! The Butterfly Effect Have you ever heard of the butterfly effect? It’s this theory that a tiny little butterfly could flap its wings at just the right moment and iit would cause a huge tropical storm and that tropical storm wipes out an entire village of people and that village was home to an important political figure and so on and so forth. It’s basically saying that small, seemingly inconsiderable actions can lead to large unforeseen consequences. It’s fascinating to think about how we live in such a vast and complex system that even the teeniest weeniest little changes can have gargantuan effects somewhere else. One small word. One mall action. One small butterfly. ...can change the entire course of the universe. Kinda crazy, dontchya think? Everything is so interconnected so tightly. It’s bizarre! I mean something so minuscule can be so impactful to the grand scheme of things. That can really send your head in a whirl if you really sit down and start to think about it. It means every little decision you make can literally change the world. Of course, this phenomenon, the Butterfly Effect, is often thought of in terms of the past. One little thing, as simple as stepping on a butterfly, could alter history as we know it. I suppose it’s human nature to think of the past. After all, it’s more concrete than the unwritten future. The past is in the books. It’s already written. We know what happened. Whereas the future is sort of vague; it’s uncertain. We’re not sure what’ll happen for sure. We go on to fantasize about how the past history could look different if it were to change, whether that's the history of the world or just your own personal history. We like to imagine how small choices in the past could lead us to living very different lives in the present. Truth is though, you know just as much about what *would have happened* in the past as you do about what *could* happen in the future. It’s completely up to your imagination to determine the results. What I’m getting at here is that if you can daydream about how little things in the past could change the present day, then you can see how the little things you do right now can change the future day. “The Butterfly Effects” of today create the reality of tomorrow. In short, the little things you do right now, in the present can have large effects later down the road. Choosing to eat a salad for lunch instead of a hamburger can be the “butterfly” of becoming physically healthier in the future. Choosing to invest your money, instead of spending it on a lottery ticket or something else equally as wasteful can be the “butterfly” of becoming rich in the future. You see, the small choices you make every day will have a LARGE impact one day. Eventually. While you’re busy pining after the long lost past, you’re giving up opportunities that you have RIGHT NOW (and will later regret not taking in the future). By giving into the painful woes of regret, you put yourself in an eternal cycle of moping around in regret, losing out on opportunities, then later regretting missing said opportunities in the future. Rinse n’ repeat. Be lazy. Don’t make big moves or grand gestures. Realize that the little things you do in your everyday life, the seemingly inconsequential decisions you make day in and day out, like what coffee to buy or whether to even start your day with a coffee in the first place, can make a BIG difference in the long run. Do a little bit. Do just enough. Do things….half-assed. A Half-Assed effort is the little butterfly that’ll make a HUGE change in your life. Mistakes are Meh If you find yourself wallowing in regret for a very long time, beating yourself up over how you “shoulda, coulda, woulda,” relax, man. It’s all good. What happened, happened. It’s done. It’s over. Move on. Slow n’ steady. You have to forgive yourself for your own fuck ups. Forgive yourself for letting an opportunity slide, for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, for forgetting that one important thing you promised to do. Yeah, it’s true you can’t change the past and go back and fix all the mistakes you ever made, but what you can do, is do better in the future. You can avoid the same mistakes from now on. Don’t look at mistakes like some sort of detriment to your life. Mistakes are a tool for learning. They’re an opportunity for you to grow. It’s funny how mistakes work. I mean you look back at it and tell yourself “I wouldn’t do that now.” Thing is, you wouldn’t have know how to do it *right* if you didn’t make that mistake in the first place. Kind of catch 22. You have to make a mistake to know you made a mistake. You have to fuck up to know you fucked up. Mistakes are pretty harsh life teachers. Certainly, you know better NOW, but back then you didn’t. And that’s okay. The easiest way to let go of regret is to tell yourself that you made the best decision you could at the time, given your knowledge you had and emotions you were feeling then. When you think in terms of “I did my best I could at the time”, then there really is no reason to regret *anything*. Accept all the wrongs you did. Acceptance is the key. That doesn’t mean you like it. That doesn’t mean you’re proud of it. It simply means, you don’t let it bother you. You’re okay with the fact that you didn’t make the *right* decision, but you did make the *best* decision you could at the time given everything you knew and everything you felt at the time it was done. Let Go and Go With the Flow Holding onto regret does nothing but stress you out. It causes more pain than the initial mistake or fuck up caused to begin with. Regret is picking at the scab and never letting it fully heal.It’s sticking your hand in the building pot of water after scalding your finger. It’s essentially just opening up a fresh wound of emotional pain. You gotta just go with it, man. Go with the flow. Relax on down the stream. Let go of your negative thoughts about the past and see it as a growth milestone, not as your defeat. You can’t change what happened, no matter how much you wish you could. The more you think about it, the more the pain will linger. The more you fill yourself with thoughts of “shoulda, coulda, woulda” and “what if”, the more you lose out on opportunities that are available in the present. Be present with yourself and the world around you. You know a lot more today than you did yesterday. Use that to your advantage. Remember, just like the Butterfly, one small ripple can cause a whole tsunami. Take small, slow, and steady steps towards being able to say “I’m proud I did that” as your future self, rather than “I regret I ever did that.” Life is about change. The things you did yesterday changed who you are today. And the things you do today will change who you are tomorrow. Every little thing that you do can completely change your world. So even though you’re lazy and don’t do very much, the *very little* that you do do will determine who you are and where you’re at in the future. Don’t regret how things turned out “so far” in your life. See it as an ongoing process. After all, there’s no rush to do anything, man, yet alone become the best version of yourself. Take it easy, N8
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Whenever you go out to achieve some sort of goal, you may be tempted to make it absolutely *known* to people about what you’re doing or planning on doing. You want anybody and everybody to know that you’re such a big achiever, a real go-getter.
After all, you wouldn’t want them to think you’re some sort of lazy bum, sittin’ around doing nothing. But you are. And that’s what you’re doing. Of course, you fall under peer pressure to make yourself look good, to project a false image that’s worthy of praise. You boast and embellish in hopes to win some sort of applause (and maybe a cookie?) Maybe you’ll go outside for less than five minutes to your local park and post a selfie with the status “Great day for a hike!” then go back inside lying around watching Netflix. Maybe you’ll post a picture of a salad and say “Feels good to eat healthy.” then eat a bunch of mozzerella sticks, Buffalo wings, and pizza after the salad. Maybe you’ll post a selfie in a suit you tried on at the mall with #feelingclassy only to go back home lounging in your PJs. Despite the display you show on the outside, it’s nothing but a foolhardy performance at best and shitty acting at worst. You see how easy it is to be so concerned with success that you’d rather *look* like success than actually *be* it? Truth is, you ain’t winning shit. You’re touting a victory that was never won. You’re pulling for glory while doing inglorious things. You’re celebrating an achievement that never happened...all in the goddamn wish to be seen as awesome and successful in the eyes of others. Man, I say embrace your laziness. You’re trying to impress people that frankly don’t give a fuck about you. So lean back, relax, and don’t give a fuck about them Besides, as we covered last week, success is largely overrated, in terms of attaining materialistic things, like fame or wealth. It’s better to have other people think you’re a lazy bum, when you’re really building success (in terms of happiness and freedom) from your couch, than it is to pretend you’re this really big deal when frankly you’re in over your head. In other words, it's best to *move silently.* It’s best not to say a goddamn word about what you’re doing or what you’re achieving. Make careful, thoughtful, and *slow* moves, then only speak when you get to say “checkmate”. That’s the way of a true procrastin8r. More sleeping. And less waking everybody else up to tell them about what you’re doing. It’s all about the core of laziness: minimizing effort and maximizing results. It takes way less effort to just keep moving forward than it does to create some sort of grand gesture or announcement every step along the way. And the results are bigger when you are happy because you’re proud of yourself for doing what you did, not proud of the fact that you feel admired by others. Anyway, we’re gonna take a look at how to move calmly and quietly towards your goals today in the blog and without further ado, let’s dive….right into it! Don’t celebrate before victory. People can celebrate way too early, man. I mean, it happens in sports all the time. No doubt you’ve probably come across some meme videos scattered across the Interwebs of a runner or cyclist waving their arms in victory of quote on quote “winning” the race, seconds prior to someone behind them passes them before crossing the finish line. Or maybe you’re familiar with Super Bowl XLIX, where the Seattle Seahawks were pretty much “guaranteed” a win, with less than 10 yards away from the winning touchdown against the New England Patriots, with one of the best running backs in the entire league, Marshawn Lynch (aka Beast Mode) practically within reach of the goal post. I mean the dude’s literally known for pummeling through opponents’ defense like a “beast”. Well the quarter back Russel Wilson made the executive decision NOT to pass the ball to Lynch but instead go for some sort of weird pass to another player that he MISSED. Meanwhile, Seahawk fans were shouting “Beast Mode”, practically celebrating their super bowl ring, before the last play was made. But outside of the sports world, you might hear from the dude who is” makin money moves” with his business, only to watch him end up bankrupt a few months later. Or the ex reality star who celebrates his winning of a Presidential election, only to see the poll results say otherwise *cough*cough* Trump (which to this day he and his supporters still deny). You don’t win until the game is over. You don’t finish the race until you cross the finish line. You don’t win an election until you actually get voted for. You don’t achieve a goal until you actually do it. You’ll wind up being disappointed, not only in the eyes of others, but in yourself if you try to glorify a victory that hasn’t been earned yet. Procrastinate your celebration. Put it off. Wait ‘til later. Take pride in the process of making your way toward the goal, and not just in the end result. Don’t act like you’ve made it, when you still have a long way to go. Enjoy each slow n’ steady step along the way. Don’t focus so much on what you can win in the end, but on what you can learn along the way. As the popular quote goes “Life is about the journey, not the destination.” I’ll add to that and say don’t make it out like you’ve reached the destination while you’re still along the journey. Have patience. You’ll get there...eventually. You’re not there *yet*. You will be, at some point. Just don’t pretend you’re already “there” when you’re really not anywhere close. Doing things early is NOT the way of a procrastin8r. Needless to say, premature celebration is very un-procrastin8r. Yay you did it! No need to announce it to the world. Seriously. There’s a such thing as being proud of yourself for the sake of being proud of yourself. There’s a such thing as making an achievement without letting others know about it. Let your accomplishments speak for themselves. You don’t need to shout about it. Don’t let anyone know you’re saving up for a Tesla, until you pull up driving it. Don’t let anyone know you’re getting in shape, until they see you in your beach bod. Don’t tell anyone that you’re building a business from the couch until you hand in your 2 week notice to quit your day job. Achievement is louder and grander than any sort of boasting you can do while attempting to earn said achievement. Take pride in what you actually get done, not on what you plan on doing. Certainly, look forward to accomplishing your goal, but don’t let that goal define who you are RIGHT NOW. Likewise, find satisfaction in the accomplishment itself, not just the applause that may or may not come with it. Be in the present. Know where you’re at in the moment. Be realistic. Be humble. Cheer for yourself and don’t rely on others to do that for you. It’s more amazing of a feat if you do something awesome like it really ain’t a big deal, than to prance around like your God’s gift to the world before actually doing anything noteworthy. The mere thought of being something doesn’t make you that something. It can, some day. But that takes slow n’ steady time. There’s a difference between seeing potential within yourself and believing you already reached that potential. There’s a difference between being a procrastin8r and saying “I’ll get there eventually” and being poser and saying “I’m already there.” And even when you DO achieve something big, see it as just another slow n’ steady step towards your ultimate goal of fulfillment and reaching that best version of yourself. Hard workers make it a point to tell their boss (as well as everybody else) just how good of a job they’re doing. You, a procrastin8r, on the other hand, don’t care about such recognition. You just take it easy and go with the flow, allowing yourself to achieve without exerting any extra effort to “prove thyself.” People work so hard to let others know how hard they’re working. Not you. You minimize effort and maximize results. You put no extra effort into self-promotion. After all, the most effective self-promotion is caring for yourself and not what others think. Embrace Your Inner-Sloth The sloth doesn’t roar or bark or neigh. He just does his things. Slowly. Quietly. He climbs that tree, to the top of his goal, without making a big deal about it. He ain’t making a fuss or trying to echo his voice throughout the jungle to let everybody know he is KING, baby! No. He just calmly makes his way to the top of that tree, making no sound, besides maybe cute little squeaks. Whatever sounds he makes though, it’s not his intention to gloat around. He’s just minding his own business. Mind your own business and do what you want, without any sort of attempt to holler or otherwise roar about it to the rest of the “jungle.” That is to say, climb to the top of your goals, like a sloth to a tree, ever so slowly and ever so silently. I’ll use a quote for a similar analogy that furthers the point I’m talking about here:““A seed grows with no sound, but a tree falls with huge noise. Destruction has noise, but creation is quiet. This is the power of silence. Grow silently.” Do it for the Accomplishment NOT the “Likes” In the age of Social Media, everybody wants to post about what they’re doing, or at least the embellished version of what they’re doing. Look….Social Media is fake as fuck. Fake. As. Fuck. It’s not real. It’s all idealism. You don’t know anyone on social media. All you know is this heroic fantasy version of themselves they created. So many people will start posting their gym selfies, only to find themselves sittin’ in a drive-thru at McDonald’s a few months later. So many people will post about their humanitarian deeds of making a donation to some sort of non-profit organization or good cause, only to tell the next homeless person they see on the street to “Shove off, buddy!” People go on Social Media to compare themselves to others. “How am I doing compared to everyone else?” is the thought that consciously or not creeps up in everyone’s mind as they open that app on their phone. And of course, they’re loaded with images of people doing elaborate things -- doing a hard work out, making a fancy meal from scratch, touring on an exotic vacation, what have you. They see all these AMAZING things that *other* people are doing and of course want to post something at least equally if not more AMAZING to “fit in the crowd”. Then if you’re not posting this amazing thing, but everyone else is, well you get anxious with that FOMO, that fear of missing out. And so the cycle begins. You see a post of something you might be missing out on, so you post something that other people might be missing out on, and those who see it post another thing that even more people might be missing out on and so on and so forth. What you end up with is a series of posts trying to “out FOMO” each other, in sum. What you have to realize though is that all you’re looking at is a glimpse, a mere and simple glimpse, of people’s lives. You’re not seeing the whole picture: the hardships, the woes, or even everyday boring mundane things that happen. You’re seeing a catered collage that’s designed to make you think “I wish I was doing that.” Look, life is a lot more enjoyable, I mean *a lot* more enjoyable when you eliminate the addictive need to try and make yourself a glimmering spotlight in the eyes of others. Once you do that, you can do things because you actually enjoy them, not because you want others to wish they could enjoy it. You can achieve things because you actually want to, not because you want likes or applause. Frankly, no one really cares about you all that much. To clarify, I mean the majority of your friends list don’t care about you and what you’re doing. Certainly you can have a close group of family and friends that quietly cheer you on, but the fact of the matter is, they probably already know about it. I mean, they’re your close people after all. You really don’t need to tell the rest of the world what you do and what you’ve been up to. No one gives a fuck. The only reason they might give a fuck is either they want to *compare* their own set of achievements to yours or because they want to try and tear you down, not because they're *actually* interested in what you're doing. I don’t say that to make you anxious and think you’re all alone and nobody likes you. I say that to encourage you to have the realization that what you’re doing doesn’t matter to others. And if it doesn’t matter to others, in the grand scheme of things, then your life can become a bed to relax on, rather than a stage to perform on. Have more than you show. And speak less than you know. That is the way of a procrastin8r. Now to wrap up this article, I’ll give you a quote from Joana Mejia, which reads as follows: “Move in silence and let your success make all the noise.” Take it easy, N8 Success is something we all want, or at least it’s very well advertised as something we *should* want. At any rate, it’s believed that earning success is an important thing to do in life.
But the question is what do you picture when you imagine yourself being successful? I mean, what exactly does success look like to you? Is it the fancy sports car sitting in your driveway of your huge mansion? Is it the sipping of a glass filled with fancy champagne on your own yacht? Is it seeing your face plastered all over billboards and magazines? Is it logging into your bank app and seeing millions of dollars in your account? You know, success is often associated with attaining a certain amount of assets or notoriety. It’s accumulating material wealth and making a name for yourself in the public eye. But at the end of the day, no matter how big your house is or what the number is next to the dollar sign in your bank account or how fast your car drives, or how many people know your name, what does it matter, what does *any* of it all matter, if you’re not even happy? See, society pressures us to see success as some sort of materialistic thing -- money, property, and even “likes” on social media. It’s seen as something you must “work hard” to achieve. “You want success? Well you better get to it and work your ass off to make it happen!” is the message we’re essentially told from our early years as a child all the way into adulthood. We’re brainwashed our entire lives to believe that success is rare and hard to obtain and is measured by material things that you must work for to earn. It’s convincing propaganda. No doubt. Heck, I even used to think I was “too lazy” to ever really be successful. I didn’t think I’d really amount to much. I spent years struggling with pushing myself to do more, get more, and be more because that’s all success is and ever could be...or so I believed. But eventually I realized something important. I realized that the idea of success is completely subjective. Despite what you’ve been lead to believe, there really is no objective measure of success. In fact, you can be as lazy as you want and still be wildly successful. It’s just a matter of filling your mind with the right thoughts, not filling your wallet with the right amount of dough. I’m going to guide you through my thought process that led me to the conclusion that success, at least the way it's portrayed in society, is severely overrated and how I decided to measure my success instead. And without further ado, let’s dive….right into it! WTF is Success? Let’s start by looking at the raw definition of success, which reads as follows: “The accomplishment of an aim or purpose”. That’s straight from the dictionary. Notice there’s nothing in there about dollars being made or fame being earned. All that’s necessary for success is some type of purpose. As long as you fulfill that purpose, then congratulations! You’re a success, baby! But what is this purpose? Well, the answer isn’t in the dictionary or really any sort of text book. And quite frankly, I’d hate to tell you, but ya ain’t gonna find that answer in this blog either. I mean, certainly, I can point you in the right direction, but that’s about it. See, the answer to what that purpose is, is inside YOU. That’s where the subjective nature of success comes into play. You decide that purpose. You choose what success looks like to you. You define what makes you “successful.” To put it bluntly, success is “the fuck” you give. In other words, what actually matters to you? What underlying principle determines your everyday decisions? What’s worth getting out of bed for, you lazy bastard? Maybe that purpose is to be honest. Well, as long as you always tell the goddamn truth, you’re absolutely a success. Doesn’t matter if you’re piss poor broke, as long as you uphold your purpose. You want to make the purpose that measures your success an “either or” type thing, like either you have it or you don’t. For example, either you tell the truth or you bullshit. Either you act kind or you act like a douche bag. Either you’re relaxed or you’re hectic. You get the gist. See, if your purpose is something that you can consistently collect more of, like money or fame, then that just puts you in a perpetual loop of wanting more, getting more, then wanting more again, never fully reaching success because there’s always “more” to get But if you make your purpose an “either or” type thing, then you no longer have a reason to covet anything more, cause it’s like you either have it or you don’t. You don’t accumulate honesty, you’re either honest or you’re not. In short, to answer the question “WTF is success”. Success is what you make it. You don’t make yourself out to be a success. You make success out to be you. In other words, you want to base your idea of success on who you are, what you think, and what you value Make Your Vision of Success Simple You gotta take it easy, man. People will tell you to chase after your dreams, to go no holds barred. But man, you can always see your dreams in your sleep. No but seriously, don’t pine after some sort of fantasy in your head to make you happy and feel like you’ve been successful in life. Find something simple to measure your success on. Contrary to popular belief, earning success doesn’t have to be anything hard or back-breaking. It doesn’t need to be big or elaborate either. It can be...just enough. Just enough to make you happy. Just enough to get you to be able to enjoy life. Heck, enjoying life can be “success” itself. If you try to achieve success by doing something way over your head, if you make it out to be this big complex thing, it doesn’t matter what you manage to do, no matter how much money you make or fame you get, you’ll just be straight up miserable. And by the way, the most complex thing you can make success be is something you have no control over. Dave Mustaine, the famous lead guitarist of the band Megadeth, saw himself as a failure. That’s right the dude who started one of the biggest metal bands of all time believes he failed at life. What? How? The dude got the fame, he got the money. He has it all. What happened is he was kicked out of a band. He made his measure of success to be better than that band -- to sell more albums, to sell more concert tickets. That band he got kicked out of was Metallica. Now, Megadeth is no doubt wildly successful in terms of selling millions of copies of their albums and selling out concert venues...but they’re no Metallica. Because Mustaine made his measure of success “be better than Metallica” and he wasn’t able to achieve that, he saw himself as a failure. Now, of course, making a big achievement like that is completely outside of his control. He can’t control the success of another band he isn’t a part of. Perhaps if he saw success as something simple, like making some bad ass metal music, then he wouldn’t be so harsh on himself. Success is basically what you *focus* on. It’s the fuck you give, as mentioned earlier. Stop giving a fuck about how you compare to others or what amount of wealth you manage to accumulate, and start giving those fucks to greater principles. Do things with a *meaningful* purpose in mind ,not something completely arbitrary or outside of your control for that matter. Don’t just do it to earn more dollars or seek approval. It’s a lazy yet effective way to be successful. Don’t Let Anyone Define Success for You Remember, success is *subjective*, meaning just because you look like a low life loser who sits on the couch all day to *others*, doesn’t mean you aren’t a success. Don’t let anyone else set the standard for how you should be living and what you should be accomplishing. Make your own sets of rules. Play your own game. Don’t change yourself and your values to match others’ expectations. Just be your own Dude and abide. Just because owning a house with a white picket fence is seen as success in the eyes of others, doesn’t mean you have to make such a thing *your* definition of success. You can live in a one bedroom apartment and still be successful. Again, it’s a matter of abiding by a purpose in life that you should let determine your success, not a certain status or monetary value. Be Happy When You’re Poor Make your goal to obtain happiness, not riches. I mean you can have all the riches in the world and still be an absolute miserable fuck. Aim to be happy. Aim to enjoy life. Money doesn’t magically bring enjoyment to life. All money brings is the desire to want even more money. You must find satisfaction *within* yourself and not seek it in something external or materialistic. See, success to me is a feeling; it’s a state of being, not a number on your paycheck or any sort of asset you could own. Success is a feeling of fulfillment. That’s a feeling you get when you are meeting a certain requirement or condition. And what is that requirement/condition? Well, that is your purpose. Meet your purpose and you will soon meet success. All the other “things” you get from meeting your purpose become arbitrary. In other words, it is indeed possible to become rich and famous by living out your purpose in life, but that sort of becomes a byproduct of doing things, as opposed to the entire point of doing things in the first place. Hard Work is NOT the Way to success People can work their ass off their whole lives, only to be left feeling completely unfulfilled, with a lingering pain of self-hate and regret in their final moments. Lean back and enjoy the moment. Be proud of what you’re doing and who you are. The way I see it, the more willing you are to uphold a certain purpose or principle, the less likely you are to ever do something (or avoid doing something for that matter) that you later regret on your deathbed. See, once you find your purpose in life, then life is easy. No longer are you struggling with what to do next and how to do it. No longer are you concerned about getting more of an amount of anything. Each decision you make becomes simple, it comes natural, like secondhand nature. When you ask yourself something like: Am I being truthful? Am I bringing about peace? Am I being just? Then you’ll know what to do next. You ain’t gotta work hard to make your move. You just move slow n’ steady, taking your time to do things that are important to you, doing things that further your purpose. You can be successful in everything you do, as long as you focus on that purpose. I’ll give you a personal example here. I used to be so concerned about the number of listeners on my podcast and how many people were reading my blog. And quite frankly, it began to take a toll on my motivation to even make content at all. But when I focused on the goal of “to bring *value* to my audience”, when I focused on a greater purpose than getting more sheer numbers, producing content became a hell of a lot easier. It became about what I have to offer the world, not about what the world has to offer me. You can apply the same principle to your own life and your own goals. Focus on a greater purpose, find what YOU have to offer, and success is really nothing to stress over or work hard for. It’s something that just comes natural. Embrace your laziness, fellow procrastin8r and find success *within* yourself, rather than in the outside world. Take it easy, N8 Hmm...A ticket for a chance to win millions upon millions of cold hard cash...seems like the ultimate lazy method to becoming rich. I mean all you do is purchase a little ticket, then sit on back and if you’re lucky enough, get a HUGE deposit straight into your bank account. Talk about minimizing effort and maximizing results, right? Doesn’t take much effort to buy a ticket and the results? Well being a millionaire is certainly putting it to the max!
Gambling your money in the lottery no doubt appears like an easy peasy lemon squeezy way to land yourself in riche. Heck, you can retire the day you win the lottery, never having to work another goddamn day in your life, never having to schlep 9 to 5 for a belligerent boss, never having to even get off your freaking couch. Just relax all day and do whatever the hell you want, whatever you’re in the mood for -- no obligations, no work loads, no assignments, no due dates. You choose what to do and when to do it. You make your own schedule and don’t have to get anything done within a certain time frame assigned to you. Instant retirement. Instant financial success. The dream come true. “If you’re lucky enough” though. See, luck is a huge factor in determining your success with the lottery. And let me tell you straight up: Luck is NOT on your side. I mean you thought finding a shiny Pokemon was rare. Well, you don’t need even a *fraction* of the amount of luck to find a shiny Pokemon as you do to win the lottery. Chances are, when you choose to buy a lottery ticket, you’ll just be wasting money. Point blank. You’ll be making yourself more poor in hopes of getting rich, in reality. See, despite how tempting it may be to look at the jackpot number and imagine yourself having hundreds of millions of dollars, the fact of the matter is, you might as well flush the money you’d spend on a lottery ticket down the toilet because you ain’t gonna win shit! I mean, hypothetically, yes, there’s a chance, a *slight* chance that the MEGA MILLIONS could be yours, but the total likelihood of even seeing a single cent, yet alone a whopping heap of cash as a return on investment are jack diddly squat. The only heap you’ll end up with is the old receipts of your tickets ,piling up in your junk papers upon that mess in your room, you lazy bastard. And look, I ain’t about to write up this whole article to tell you “You can’t win the lottery so work hard to earn your money instead.” No. That would entirely defeat the purpose behind the philosophy of this blog and everything we stand for here. We’re all about being lazy and getting away with it here. What I am saying though is that if you do indeed want to be lazy and minimize effort and maximize results with your money, there’s a way to do that. It just so happens NOT to be in purchasing lottery tickets. There are ways to get your money to earn you *even more* money. It’s just not in banking your luck to win the multi-million jackpot. Now I’ll be frank and tell you straight up that the money you earn *passively* ain’t gonna make you rich quick. But it can make you rich...slowly. Embrace your inner sloth and get rich slowly. Be patient with your finances. It pays off. Literally. Anyway, before we get into some of the suggested methods of how to make money with your money, let’s first look at why its most certainly NOT buying lottery tickets. And without further ado, let’s dive...right into it! The Odds Are Slim You have such a low chance of winning the lottery that spending your money on a ticket just ain’t worth it. I mean, we’re talking about a fraction of a fraction of a fraction chance of winning. Microscopic numbers here. Teeny tiny numerals. Let’s do a bit of the math. Statistically speaking, in a typical pick 6 number lottery, your odds of winning are roughly 1 in 14 million. One in 14 million. Let that sink in. Like holy shit. Have you ever achieved *anything* with that type of odds? No, no, you haven’t. You probably won’t ever. As matter of fact, I’m confident enough to say you *won’t* ever. Period. It’s just that slim of a chance. And sure, the Avengers managed to save the universe from Thanos whipping out half the population with such odds, but face it, we’re not living in the Marvel cinematic universe. We’re living in reality. To put this all in perspective, you statistically have a higher chance of Dating a super model (1 in 88,000), winning an Oscar 91 in 11,500), or even getting struck by freaking lightning (1 in 10million) than you do of picking the right numbers for the jackpot. Heck, you probably have a better chance of finding a hundred dollar bill on the chance every single day for the rest of your life than actually winning the lottery. Of course, I don’t have to exact numbers of something like this to be fair, but you get the point. Your probability of winning is so microscopically low that it’s pretty much impossible at worst or laughable at best. The numbers speak for themselves. You can hope, wish, and pray as hard and as much as you want. You can perform your weird little rituals like wearing your old Nirvana t-shirt inside out while doing the floss dance. But fact of the matter is, the odds are ridden against you. And winning has nothing to do with your knowledge, expertise, or skill. It’s fully and completely based on luck. No strategy Just a roll of a die. (one of the reason I hate playing the game Monopoly, but I digress) A 14 million sided die at that! One in 14 million. Seriously. I mean, you might as well, write off the money you spend on a lottery ticket as “lost money” at that point. You ain’t getting it back and you certainly ain’t winning. Hate to break your dreams, Mr. Lucky, but you ain’t *that* lucky. I mean you can hang as many rabbit foots in your room as you want. You can carry as many 4 leaf clovers in your pocket as you want (speaking of which you have a higher chance of finding enough 4-leaf clovers to stuff a pillow than you do of winning the lottery, as the odds are 1 in 10,000). You can knock on wood performing the drum solo of Moby Dick by Led Zeppelin live version (about an hour song). It doesn’t matter, you still ain’t winning. And let’s entertain the idea that maybe these superstitious type rituals *do* actually provide some sort of “boost” to your luck. Well even if it doubled your luck, even if it tripled, heck even if it you did something that made you *a hundred times* more lucky, you’d STILL be looking at a fraction of a fraction of a fraction chance of winning. I mean when we say the odds are against you, I ain’t talking about picking one card out of a deck of 52 type of “odds against you”. I’m talking picking one grain of sand in an entire sandbox type of odds against you. And I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking “Well what about scratch offs??” I’ll tell you about scratch offs though. Still ain’t worth it. There. End of discussion. Alright, but let’s get into it. Now, scratch off tickets usually have a win rate between 3-30%. The odds are waaayy better in your favor compared to the number draw for sure. But you gotta keep in mind that your “winnings” more likely than not are going to be an amount *less than* what you paid for the scratch off ticket. You’re at a loss, a negative ROI (Return On Investment). You could pay $30 for your scratch off, and quote on quote “win $2. Well that just sets you back $28. Of course, you could actually profit as well, tenfold. You could win maybe even a couple thousand dollars from that single scratch off ticket alone. But again, *odds are against you*. You’re likely to wind up LOSING money more so than gaining any sort of profit. It’s a total gamble, really. And gambling is a fool’s game. A smart man’s game is strategic. We’ll get to some smart strategies for your money in a sec, but first I want to cover an important point... Rich People Don’t Buy Lottery Tickets. It’s true. Lottery tickets exploit the poor and middle class by enticing them with the hopes of instant riches. Lottery tickets literally bring in BILLIONS of dollars to the government every year. It’s almost like a sort of “secret tax” that only the poor and middle class pay. Of course, it’s totally optional to pay this tax, the rich have found out, as they do with most other taxes. Rich people are always looking for ways to make more money from their money. They’re constantly calculating where to put their money in order to yield the largest return in their investment. Now don’t you think that if the lottery was a profitable endeavor, all these rich investors would be hoarding up as many lottery tickets as possible? But that’s not the case. That’s not the case at all. Rich people don’t put money into the lottery because they know it won’t bring them any profit. The jackpot of the lottery sort of a false incentive to get you to pay more taxes. I mean think about, what is a tax? A portion of money you earn that’s given directly to the government, without any sort of return. Well, with the fractional numbers we talked about earlier regarding your chances of winning said jackpot, you’re, as we mentioned, flushing your money down the toilet, that is, giving it to the government, and thus paying a tax. Really fucked up if you think about it. They (the government) sell you the idea that you too could be rich to get you to pay them *even more* money (for a lottery ticket) on top of the ridiculous amount of money that they already steal from your hard earned paycheck. All while allocating all that money directly to tax cuts for the wealthy and upper class. So yeah, since the lottery is basically a tax disguised as a fun little game, and the rich like to avoid taxes as much as possible, they do NOT buy lottery tickets. And you may be thinking, well wait a minute! The people who WON the lottery ended up *becoming* rich. And while that much is true, there’s always a catch to something good, isn’t there? Let’s dive deeper. Lottery Winners Usually End Up Broke 70%. Seventy freaking percent of lottery winners wind up filing for bankruptcy at some point. That’s not just a majority. That’s an *overwhelming* majority. People that win the lottery blow their riches away more often than not. They’re given so much money they just don’t know how to handle it all. Fact of the matter is, if you’re not financially savvy while poor, you won’t magically become financially savvy if you’re handed a huge jackpot to spend. And spend is what people tend to do with the money. They’re not smart about it. They don’t invest it. They spend it. They purchase luxury items, like a fancy car, champagne, and a yacht. It all comes down to this consumer-driven culture that perpetuates buying the latest and greatest. Of course, when you *spend* money, you lose it and when you invest money, well you gain even more of it. The idea of “success” in this consumer heavy culture in which we live in is to have a lot of “stuff”. The more stuff you have, and the fancier that stuff is, the more successful you are. But the way I see success is having happiness and freedom. The lottery ticket could very well be your ticket to happiness and freedom; it can give you the ability to do what you want, pay the bills, and not have to once worry “how am I going to afford this?” But instead of living comfortably with “just enough”, because of this consumer brainwashing, people see their jackpot winnings as the the ultimate shopping spree -- the opportunity to get more stuff! They’ll go out and spend every last dollar they had faster than you can read the winning lotto numbers out loud. It’s kind of sad, really. Furthermore, lottery winners are statistically highly likely to be robbed, kidnapped, and even murdered. The rewards aren’t worth it, man. I mean I don’t know about you but I prefer NOT to be a target of criminals. Earn your wealth. Don’t hope for it. The lottery offers nothing but false hope and wishful thinking. You’re not *actually* going to win that crazy amount of cash. It’s practically as much of a fantasy as finding a unicorn in the forest. And even if you did win, be honest with yourself, would you really even know what to do with it? If your answer is something along the lines of “I’d buy (blank) -- a luxury car, a big house, my own skating rink, etc. then you’ll probably be just another statistic that ends up bankrupt in a few months, maybe a few years down the road at best. If your answer, on the other hand, is something like “pay off my (blank) --- student loans, mortgage, etc or “invest in Bitcoin, Amazon, and Tesla” then you might fall under that 30% category of people that win the lottery that DON’T end up bankrupt. A rare breed indeed. But if you’re the type of person to say you’d either pay off debt or invest with your lottery winnings, then you’re probably not the type of person to purchase a ticket in the first place, because you realize just how bad of an investment it really is. And by the way, notice I said “earn” your wealth. I didn’t say try for it. I didn't say work hard for it. I said earn it. You can earn your wealth nice and slow. Invest in stocks. Invest in crypto. Heck, even put it in a savings account for crying out loud! The interest rate ain’t nothing to write home about, but at least you’ll be accumulating wealth rather than digging yourself deeper into debt. A lottery ticket, statistically speaking is more likely to burn a hole in your pocket than it is to fill your wallet. And that’s including if you win, because as we covered, most lottery winners end up broke shortly after collecting their prize. The point is, you want to do things that actually allow your money to make you *more* money. I mean theoretically, that’s indeed why you purchase a lottery ticket in the first place. You’re *hoping* that the little money you spend can turn into a large sum of cash. You’re in a sense “investing” with the intent to make profit. What happens though is you wind up just spending this money or paying a “tax” directly to the government. It doesn’t net you any value or meaningful returns, other than an aching feeling that you “didn’t win this time.” “But maybe next time,” you’ll think to yourself. Maybe next time I *could* win. Then what do you know? You don’t win the next time or the time after that or the hundredth and seventh time after that either. You get stuck in this perpetual loop of endless hope, which never grants satisfaction. I mean, if you add up all the money you spend on lottery tickets, you’d probably have quite a sack of change, of which *could have* not only been kept but also have been gaining interest in the stock market. Yeah, sure, investments like stocks and even crypto may not seem as cool as winning the multi-mega-million jackpot overnight, but the fact of the matter is, you can “win” a jackpot *slowly* over time. You can earn your way to riches *eventually*. And that’s the way a true procrasitn8r likes to do it, eventually. Instead of putting a couple dollars into the purchase of a lottery ticket in *hopes* that it will make you rich, you can instead put that money into an investment or savings account and take the slow n steady yet *guaranteed* path to success. One dollar. One step. At. A. Time. If you’re going to participate in the Lottery, keep it recreational. Look, if after reading my entire piece here you’re still in the mode of “fuck it, I’m buying a lottery ticket”, then do so as a sort of fun thing to do, not an actual hope that you’re gonna get rich from it. I mean I suppose if you see it as some sort of hobby, that’s fine. Go ahead and buy whatever kind of lottery ticket you fancy. As long as you keep it a hobby and don’t turn it into an addiction. There’s a fine line. It should be something recreational. You could be addicted to the “thrill of luck”. Gambling is a real addiction. You’ll get trapped into the mode of thinking “I gotta win. I just gotta.” And will keep on buying chances to win, only to wind up losing in the end. Purchase a lottery ticket with the mindset that you are going to LOSE. After all, it’s better to be pleasantly surprised than it is to be severely disappointed. Take it easy, N8 |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
March 2022
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