Time is such a fascinating concept. No species on the planet, besides human beings, understands the fact that time is always running out. Since the day you were born, the clock started ticking for you. And as a being of consciousness, you’ve had (and still have) the ability to choose what exactly to do with your time. And there’s this idea that you should always choose to do the productive thing. You should always be performing something ambitious or putting effort into something useful.
Heck, I’d reckon if sleep weren’t necessary to actually, ya know, survive, sleeping would be seen as a pointless or perhaps even harmful endeavor. Sleeping would hold the same level of stigma as shooting up dope, like it’s only something you do if you’re a stupid junkie. Forget rejuvenating your mind and body. Forget relieving stress. Just pull up your boot straps and git r’ dun! I mean already, people say “sleep is for the weak” and advocate forgoing rest in order to work, exercise, or otherwise “continue to hustle”. It’s this attitude of “don’t sleep unless you absolutely NEED to”, and even then, push yourself to stay awake for one more workout routine, for one more project complete. Just keep the hustle up and don’t stop! Sleep will only slow you down. Hustling and Bustling. That’s all we do, or are expected to do at least. We’re always in a rush, or very well pressured to be in a rush. We’re in such a hurry to get things done that we don’t take time to “stop and smell the roses” or take it easy once in a while, for that matter. We’re always jumping from one task to another, one obligation to the next. And never really take the time to...relax. And any time we try to spend in Leisure (the big “L” in L.A.Z.Y.), it is seen as a complete and utter waste of time. Being the only conscious beings in the world, who are aware of what time is and how it works, we end up pressuring ourselves to always make use of that time rather than watch it fritter away. A squirrel doesn’t choose to spend his day collecting nuts, he just does it out of pure instinct for survival. Likewise, a lion doesn’t choose to spend his day hunting gazelle, he just does it to satisfy his hunger. Animals don’t plan or schedule how they’ll use their time efficiently, they sort of just go with whatever hunch they’re feeling. But ya know what? Because of their lack of awareness of time, they don’t feel so pressured to get things done with that time, like we as humans do. They do what they want, when they want, without any sort of There’s admiration in that, quite frankly. -- doing what you want with your time, rather than chaining yourself to a freaking schedule and beating yourself up about being late. The lion feels no guilt or remorse by lying in the field all day. He just feels like he wants to sleep, so he does. Now if that lion were a person, we might call him out for “wasting his time”. Think about an employee who sleeps on the job. They're not only wasting their own time, but wasting company time as well, at least that’s how it’s seen in a corporate central society. Certainly, there’s a limited amount of time we have in life. None of us get out alive, so you might as well have fun while you’re here and appreciate every single moment. And for all intents and purposes, there’s no sense in wasting any of that limited time you have. Now of course, with that said, that doesn’t necessarily mean you need to be vigorous about your time, just conscious about it. In other words, you must consciously choose what to do with your time, even if you choose to do something rather unproductive. You must Procrastinate with Purpose. It’s your time, so do what you will with it. And that’s the key: doing what you *want*, as opposed to what you feel *required* to do. It’s more important to live a life of desire than one of obligation. Don’t indebt yourself to always be out on the hunt. Lie down and take a nap on the planes, like that lion, to put it in a metaphor. In more straightforward terms, don’t feel like you’re required to always hustle about to do something. Doing nothing has its merits. You wouldn’t believe that though, would you? Not in this work hard culture we’ve been raised in. The premise is set for us to believe that if you ain’t doing shit with your time, then you ain’t shit, period. In this profit-driven society, we’re constantly bombarded with messages to make every single minute of our lives productive. In fact, the mere act of existing doesn’t make you valuable in our culture. You must work hard, achieve some sort of grand feat, or otherwise make big moves in order to amount to anything worthwhile in the eyes of society. But I believe, there’s value in a person just being a person, even if they so happen to choose to lie on the couch all day, even if they do nothing. Today we’re going to take a look at how to make the best of your time in life, even if that means quote on quote “wasting” it. And without further ado, let’s dive...right into it! We’re all completely wasted! Every second of our lives is spent towards some means of productivity, whether that’s grinding 8 hours on the daily at your day job, cleaning up and doing chores at home, or paying bills, there’s always something we’re doing to make use of our time. Life becomes an eternal to-do list. Once one thing is checked off, about three or four more tasks take its place. It’s a never-ending call of duty. And that’s the false notion I really want to address here today: that we must consistently MAKE USE OF our time. It’s okay to have a small to-do list. It’s okay to be lazy ,contrary to popular belief. Making use of your time means performing noteworthy achievements or making progress towards said achievements. While there are kudos for doing that, to a certain extent. I mean it is good to level up and earn a praiseworthy accomplishment or two once in a while. But if you’re constantly doing that, if you’re always no matter what being productive, despite how physically tired or emotionally drained you may feel, well that means you’re never taking time to unwind and rejuvenate that energy loss. And if you don’t take time to unwind, then you’re tight and on-edge. You’re mentally unhinged and emotionally unstable. You deplete yourself of energy and wind up, well, pretty damn wasted. In attempts not to waste time, you end up wasting yourself. I mean let’s face it, just like there is a limited amount of time we all have, there’s also a limited amount of stamina we have too. Doesn’t matter how much or how long you “push” yourself, at some point or another, you are going to hit fatigue. Of course, the message of encouragement will be to “just suck it up”, to keep moving, and never give up. Giving into the pressure to call it quits makes you weak. Look, man, taking a break doesn’t mean you’re giving up. It means you’re respecting your own mind, body, and spirit. Conversely, if you quit that makes you strong. It takes strength to recognize your limits and know when it’s time to take it easy and stop your achievement streak for now. It’s actually rather weak to ignore all the signs in your mind and body to stop, just to “prove thyself” or whatever. Besides, you can always continue your goal later. You can finish up your achievement...eventually. Slow n’ steady wins the race. If you try to rush to the finish line in one go, you’ll exhaust yourself before even getting there. Cut the go-getter and tough guy mantra and instead BE HONEST with yourself. After all, telling the truth is the one thing you should NOT procrastinate on. You’re lying to yourself about how much you can handle. It’s more stoic and classy to say “okay enough is enough here. I’m done.” than to barbarically insist like an irrational caveman: “CROGG NO HURT! CROGG GO ON! Calm you tits, dude. Relax. Seriously. Be lazy one in a while. You need it. Laziness is evolution. Laziness is smart. Laziness is nature’s “energy-saving mode.” It’s pretty goddamn dumb to continue working, to continue trying, to continue busting your freaking ass when your body is collapsing, your heart is torn, and your mind is breaking down. I mean you want to talk about a junkie. You ever think that maybe, just maybe you’re addicted to work and overachieving. Like a junkie, you seek the “high” of earning rewards or approval from all your try hard efforts and wind up doing yourself more harm than good. Sure, it may feel good to get more done than you had anticipated, but at the end of the day, you’re screwing yourself over by refusing to give yourself enough rest. By skipping rest in order to work all the time, you’ll age faster, lose your physical strength and coordination more quickly, and feel your mental ability decline much sooner than if you actually took the time to relax and recover when you need to. Sure, there’s a big hype to always perform well and be on the ball, so you go ahead and force yourself to “push beyond the limit.”Meanwhile you’re destroying yourself in doing so. As you “push through the pain”, you become a ticking time bomb and it’s only a matter of *time* before you explode. What’s more is you keep adding fire to that fuse; you keep adding stressors to your life by continually putting more on your plate than you can eat. You’re overstuffing your face with too much junk. Yes, eating is healthy. Just like achieving goals is necessary. But too much of it is no bueno. It’s NOT good! You should aim for a life of balance. To have leisure mixed with accomplishment. The “work/life”balance , if you will. The ProcrastiN8r never does TOO much of anything and always does “Just enough”. Strive to do “just enough”. That is the key to balance. And if there’s one principle to live by, it’s “balance.” But that could be a whole other topic for a whole other day. We’ll say that’s “just enough” for now and get back to it eventually. For now though, let’s get back to this whole little diddly about time. There’s no down time. We’re constantly on the grind, always exerting effort towards *some* task or another, non-stop persisting to get more things done. We never really settle down or ease up. Weekends are a laughable excuse for a so-called “break”. It simply isn’t enough time to recuperate after a long 40+ week of working. We have chores to do, groceries to shop for, bills to pay. There’s really hardly any time at all to just chill. We have to many obligations to attend to to allow ourselves to fully and completely embrace our Leisure. Even recreation is something we don’t permit to restore our energy. The time we spend on hobbies is time spent either trying to improve our skill, learning new techniques, or otherwise achieving some sort of goal. We even use recreational time itself to be proactive. You don’t play guitar simply to enjoy playing music, but to practice scales or chords. You don’t go out for a jog just to enjoy the outdoors and relish in the feeling of breathing but to get a good cardio work out. You don’t cook to appreciate the tastes and smells of food, but to prepare a meal for your guests. You get the gists. In doing things we enjoy, we fail to make that time enjoyable. We turn what should be a Leisure into productive work. We must focus on finding pleasure in the things we do, allowing our hobbies to relax us, rather than become just another pressure in life for us to get better at. Don’t pressure yourself, man. Just enjoy what you do, without any sort of ulterior motive (like improving skill, completing a project, winning a game, etc.). Play to have fun, not to win. Value satisfaction over victory. Look at the Dude, he bowls not to win or get a strike. He bowls because he likes it. He revels in the joy he gets from bowling. And that’s it. He abides and does his own thing, regardless of how productive it is or isn’t. He does the thing just to enjoy it. And that’s how we have to aim to spend our recreational time. Vacation, too, becomes not a time to relax and take it easy, but an opportunity to make the best of it and take advantage of all the excursions at the place you choose to travel to. We build ourselves a hard itinerary to follow -- scuba diving in the morning, jet skiing in the afternoon, fireworks in the evening, and clubbing late at night. Everything on vacation is scheduled and pre-planned. We then pressure ourselves to fulfill said schedule of activities we had planned, even if we feel too tired to do it. We wind up coming back home after a week or two and need a vacation after our vacation. You know the feeling. You come home from your tour in Europe or trip to the beach or hike out in the Grand Canyon or wherever your vacation destination was and you just feel so drained. We’re all waste, completely burnt out. We have no energy. And the time we could use to revitalize that energy is instead used to deplete it even further. We’re running on empty and barely getting by. The time you enjoy wasting is NOT wasted time. Giving yourself ample amount of time to not put yourself under any obligation or pressure yourself to achieve a certain goal and instead just waste that time doing nothing allows you to really revive yourself and feel fresh. You’ll for once in a very long time, feel rested, feel at peace, feel happy. Give yourself that much needed break. And when I say break, I mean it. Don’t constantly be forcing yourself to do things you won’t actually enjoy just because you don’t want to waste your time. Embrace your Leisure every once in a while. Fully and completely relax. Fully and completely be at rest. It’s much better to waste time than it is to waste your enjoyment of life. Take it easy, N8
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Well fellow ProcrastiN8rs, the weather’s getting cold. You know what that means. Time to hibernate and refuse to leave the house for the next few months, staying warm on the comforts of the couch.
I don’t know about you, but man, I HATE the cold! Much worse than the heat. Don’t get me wrong, being hot is uncomfortable. Especially when you’re just like...standing there and sweating your balls off. I mean, it’s one thing to be working out or doing some heavy physical labor and working up a sweat. That happens. That’s kind of expected. If I’m moving around a lot or exercising, I’m gonna sweat. It’s inevitable. But it’s a whole other realm when I’m literally just standing there and freaking pouring buckets of perspiration from my skin. The act of being idle becomes a sweaty activity. It can be so hot that being lazy is impossible, because even if you’re just lounging around doing nothing, you feel sweaty and out of breath, like you just ran a marathon. That, my friend, is certainly uncomfortable. I’ll admit. It’s not something I particularly enjoy, but I’ll tolerate it. But cold? Cold is actually painful. It literally HURTS to be cold. I mean you reach the point where you can’t even move. Your face, toes and fingers transform from human appendages to icicles and your muscles become numb. You’re literally frozen. It’s awful. There’s a fine line between *slight* discomfort and genuine PAIN, so I’ll take heat over cold any day. I’d much rather be a bit sweaty than frigidly paralyzed by icy air. Like is it really a healthy inhabitable place where the AIR hurts you? Of course, living here in the Northeastern part of the States, cold weather is something I inevitably face every year. And the only thing colder than the air outside is the heart of a dirty scammer! That’s right, my lazy dudes, winter is coming and ‘tis the season of ripoffs and fraud. Every year, during the winter season, you’ll see a slew of scammy websites, apps, products, and investment opportunities pop up left and right. While the outside world is decorated with lights, tinsel, and mistletoes, the Interwebs is decorated with fake deals, false promises, and scammy companies. What a jolly good time! Maybe people want to get a little extra cash to spend on the holidays. Maybe they want to take advantage of people’s willingness to spurage on “Black Friday” deals. Maybe, just maybe, people are on edge because they’re in pain from all this cold weather. No but seriously, for whatever the fuck reason, things take a bit of a spiral during the cold time, weather that has anything to do with the weather or not. But we’re not here to theorize about why or how that happens. We’re here to make you aware of what’s coming. Along with the bombardment of scams you’ll see crop up, we also see the impending doom of a dip in investment portfolios. Both the stock and crypto markets have a history of taking a bit of a downfall around this time of year. So unless you’re Amazon, Wal- Mart, or some other big billionaire retailer making bank during their month long Black Friday, it’s easy to lose money if you’re not careful. Last week, we covered the ProcrastiN8 Red Flags to Look Out for to Avoid Online Money-Making Scams and one of the reasons I decided to do that is because we’re about to see a blizzard of scams slam down from the skies. Today, I want to encourage you to hibernate, to relax and stay warm during this winter season. We’ll take a look at the type of bitter cold scams and frostbitten money loss traps you should look out for this season. Because just like cold weather, cold scams can cause you real PAIN! Again, I want you to be able to make a living from the comforts of your house, so I’ll share with you the experience I learned in making money online for about a decade. So grab that blanket and sit on by the fireplace, grab a mug of hot cocoa and let’s dive...right into it! The Super Awesome Deals are Super Not Real! We all want to get that special gift for that special someone...and maybe that special someone just so happens to be ourselves. Either way, when it comes to gift buying, we want to save money. Saving money in some “super deals” has become the whole gimmick of the season. Black Friday has slowly expanded into Black Month at this point, with “pre” Black Friday sales launching as soon as we howl at the moon one last time on Halloween night, Black Friday used to be a single day where stores would sell all their overstock at a huge discount, but it’s turned into a month-long phenomenon. Now stores are purchasing products for the sole purchase of being sold/displayed during Black Friday time; no longer selling just their overstock of supplies but going out of their way to buy MORE supplies just for the sake of filling the shelves. I say Black Friday “time” here too because as a key note, it’s no longer a single day of the year, but a whole fucking season of sales. And here’s the thing, it’s not even really *that* great of a deals anyway. See, there’s a lot of hype for grabbing a good deal. So much to the point, where stores aren’t offering the deep discounts that they used to during Black Friday time and instead are offering similar discounts to the random sales they have throughout the year. You’re really not saving that much. It’s all marketing. They sell you the *idea* that you’re getting a really good deal, when really it’s no more of a discount then you would have gotten during a random sale day in June, for example. Sometimes, they don’t even cut prices at all, but play off the psychology that people are out on the hunt for a good deal, so they just label it as such. Even legit companies become quite scammy this time of year, just to feed off the hype. To demonstrate how willfully hyped and ignorant people become during Black Friday, my dad and my aunt used to go out Black Friday, not necessarily to shop, but just to absolutely fuck with people. They’d grab something, totally worthless, like a pack of M&M’s and shout“OMG M&M’s ONLY A DOLLAR A PACK!” Next thing ya know, hordes of people would sprint over to grab this “exclusive deal” on candy. The kicker, the M&M’s weren’t even on sale. They were just the normal price you’d pay They used this same tactic with tampons, condoms, and even adult diapers. People would go nuts over this stuff. I ain’t kidding. Now, they aren’t marketers or anything, but they understood at a very fundamental level, people are willing to buy *anything* if they are given the premise that there’s a “limited time” to get it. It’s all about selling FOMO. Buy now or you’ll miss out on this great price! It’s the perfect opportunity to sell your snake oil. But seriously, imagine what marketers are trying to play here. The other thing too, you gotta keep in mind is that you aren’t saving money if you’re spending money you weren’t going to spend in the first place. People will buy things just for the pure reason that it’s on sale, thinking to themselves about how much money they’re saving. “Oh I better get it now while it’s so cheap”. Thing is, it doesn’t matter how cheap it is if it’s not something you really wanted to buy. Like okay, maybe if you need extra toilet paper and there’s some on sale or maybe you need a new lamp or something. But if you buy a big screen TV on an impulse just because you don’t wanna miss out on a deal, well I have news for you, bucko: you ain’t savin money. You don’t spend money to save money. It’s that simple. Of course, you may justify the purchase to yourself by saying something along the lines of “Well, I was thinking of getting one eventually. I might as well get it now while it’s on sale.” Well, that’s why you budget and save up for it. Now you’re gonna put it on your credit card because you don’t have the purchase in your budget. And then what, pay interest on the card purchase? You’ll end up paying more in interest than the amount you quote on quote “saved” on the sale. On top of that, as I mentioned, there’s probably a sale for that thing you want with as much, if not MORE of a discount than you’re getting during Black Friday. Now going along the lines of the deals aren’t worth it, it’s around this time of year that you’ll start seeing ads for straight up scam deals. This relates back to spotting a scam by seeing something that’s “too good to be true.” You’ll see something like the notorious “$28 mini laptop” WOW! What a deal! Twenty eight bucks for a laptop! If this isn’t raising red flags though, I don’t know what to tell you. There’s no computer you can build for that cheap. And even if you could, you can guarantee it’d be ridden with spyware or maybe explosives. You’ll end up getting shipped a box full of rubber bands, a surgical mask, and a RubberMaid container...or something else. I don’t know. But I’ll tell you what: that whatever’s in the box upon delivery will most certainly NOT be that little laptop you were hoping to get. This is just one example of a common “too good to be true” type deal. Scammers use it as a way to get your money, or worse, your personal info. A lot of these sites will have you enter your credit card info,. I can promise you, even if you are shipped the actual product you ordered (which spoiler alert: you won’t be), you’re risking sharing your information with some random company. The kicker is you probably won’t even get it shipped in time for Christmas anyway. These companies are usually from China or other foreign overseas countries that take weeks if not months to ship something. If you really need a cheap last minute gift or deal, do what I do, go to Five and Below or a dollar store. They have cheap deals year round and it’s not a scam. Or better yet, just stay at home. Be lazy. Forget holiday shopping. It's all corporate propoganda anyway. Let’s move on and talk about some other scams to look out for during this cold season... The Opportunity of a Lifetime! If they aren’t offering you a deal of a lifetime, well then they’re certainly going to try to offer you the opportunity of a lifetime. While the elves are busy making toys, scammers are busy making scam programs. You’re going to see EFT games, alt coins, and High Yield Investment Programs (HYIPs), all promising HUGE returns right around this time of year. This is to get you to shell out your hard earned money to fill the owners’ stockings. You’re going to see a lot of BIG projects with very ambitious goals or otherwise promises to fulfill pop up like Christmas trees in people’s houses right around now. Funny how everyone gets so inspired by eggnog and figgy pudding to achieve such grand things. Those grand things will melt away like a snowman, as each program disappears as quickly as they came. And sure, they may pay, at least for a little bit. But the program will close, the site will shut down, all before you get a chance to hit any sort of profit margin. But don’t be discouraged from investing in them at all. There are strategies you can use to come out on top. It’s a risky game, but one worth it if you manage to pull it off. You gotta play HYIPs like James Bond plays his dating game: get in early, get out fast. The early bird gets the worm, as they say. And as much as a prcorastin8r as I am, investing in an HYIP or new alt coin or EFT is nto something you want to be late to the party for. If you’re interested in how to play the HYIP game, I have an article about that I wrote before. Anyway, unless you’re playing the game the right way, you’re going to lose. Even if you do play by the right rules, there’s still a risk. It’s a gambling man’s game for sure. Just don’t be throwing your money at investment opportunities of new startups or otherwise “groundbreaking” technology or whatever. That’s all story and fluff. ‘Twas the night before losing all your money, if you’re not careful. And finally, the last thing to look out for, is not necessarily a scam, but definitely a loss trap with your investments. The Markets Will Dash Down Faster than a One Horse Open Sleigh! I don’t know if it’s people selling off their stock shares and crypto coins in order to have a bit more spending money for those oh so mediocre Black Friday deals, or if people are just following the trend and panic selling, but historically winter is a rough time for trading. I mean even right now, as of writing, the crypto market as a whole is on a steep downtrend, crashing negative 20% in just a week. But that’s all normal. It’s nothing to worry about, man. I’m no stock broker, investment expert, or otherwise financial guru. I’m just a lazy dude, so I’m not offering you any sort of advice or anything. I’m just laying out my opinion, man. But for real, the minute the temperature drops, the market drops too for a few weeks, maybe even all the months of winter, but it always recovers right around the time the first flower begins to bloom in the spring. I always see it as the real Black Friday sale. Like oooh look dividends are on sale! Bitcoin is on sale! These Axie Infinity EFTs are on sale! The worst you could do is panic sell. Never panic do anything, yet alone sell your investments. Relax and stay calm. HODL! Things will warm up, eventually. Just lay low and hibernate your investments. Brace yourselves, winter is coming! Take it easy, N8 Well, fellow procrastin8r, we just turned our clocks back and I know your lazy little self appreciated that beautiful extra hour of sleep.
It seems like an outdated practice to do that though, quite frankly. I mean, no one likes it. No one even understands why we do it. It’s just something we do. I’m surprised we don’t have more people up and arms about this whole “clock mandate” thing, crying “You can’t make me! It’s my right!” like they do with masks and vaccines *rolls eyes*. Don’t get me wrong, if I can take an extra hour in bed, I’ll go ahead and take it, but changing the time on our clocks seems like an unnecessary ritual to perform in order to achieve that. I just stay in bed, if I don’t feel like getting up despite whatever the numbers on the clock say. Nonetheless, every fall, we wind our clocks back an hour and it throws our biological clock out of loop for a few days, making us feel tired at odd hours, But in less than a week, things get back to “normal” once we adjust to the new schedule. Of course, nowadays our phones just automatically change the time for us and it’s almost unoticeable - the fact that we do change clocks. Heck, to be honest if it weren’t for the fact that my microwave and oven didn’t automatically change the time, I wouldn’t even notice that we altered the clocks to begin with. Being a lazy bastard myself, I tend to just leave the oven and microwave clock at the wrong time. I figure they’ll eventually tell the right time if I leave ‘em there long enough. After all, we’ll change our clocks yet again later in the spring. Anyway, I’m not here today to go on and on about clock changing today, as that would be a rather boring topic for a blog; I just figured I’d start with an amusing little anecdote. But today I want to once again, dive back into the roots of what this blog was all about and that is of course making money from the couch. When you’re making money from the couch, you’re naturally going to look to find ways to make money online. That can be quite a daunting task because let me warn you folks: there are so many freaking scams out there on the Interwebs. While making money online can be easy, it can be even easier to get scammed and waste your time or even money if you’re not careful. Now one thing I hate wasting is my time. I don’t mean that in the sense that I like to make every single minute productive. You know damn well I’m not. What I mean is if I am actually going to do (or at least attempt to do) something productive, I want it to be worthwhile. I want to minimize effort and maximize results, baby! That’s what laziness is all about, as I say all the time. So needless to say, I don’t want to be scammed out of my time or my money, as that requires me to put in effort and get no results in return. Any work I actually do should be worth my time, damnit! Likewise, any money I invest should reap in profit. I don’t want to spend hours and hours doing surveys, downloading games, watching ads, or whatever only to not get any sort of pay out, nor do I want to shell out my wallet only to watch it wash down the drain. In the time spent on a scam site, I could have been, I don’t know, playing Dead by Daylight or some shit, then I’d at least, ya know, have fun. It would be *worth* my time for the pure sake of enjoying myself. In the money invested in a scam site, I could have ordered pizza or something. Cowabunga at least my mouth would be satisfied. When I say I don’t like wasting my time, I mean to say I don’t like spending time on something that offers no benefit in return for the time that I invest. To clarify even further, I don’t consider lying around doing nothing is “wasting time”, as at least then you’re getting to relax and ease your stress. So I hate scams as much as you do. Making me work and put in effort and get nothing in return goes against my lazy mantra. Making money online *is possible though*. There are apps that pay you to play games. There are websites that pay you to watch videos and take surveys . The problem is, a good chunk of those sites and apps, probably an overwhelming majority, are nothing but a complete scam and waste of time. People will say that making money online is a scam, and to be fair, they aren’t completely wrong. I mean, saying “making money online is a scam” is much like saying “cops kill people”. It’s a broad statement and certainly not all websites and apps are scammy; just like not all cops are bad killers, but put it this way: there are so many “bad apples” that the entire apple farm is tainted. In other words, because there are so many scams out there, every online money-making method out there has a bit of a bad rap, even those that are legit. Now I’m telling you folks, there are legit ways to make money online, and I’ve covered some suggested methods in the past. But, given the fact that the vast majority of websites and apps out there are gonna try to either waste your time or steal your money, it’s good to have the “know how” in the ability to spot these scams so that you can avoid putting yourself through the hassle of doing extra work only to never be compensated. It’s worse than working a 9 to 5 job if you get scammed, because at least then you’re getting paid *something* for your hours. What am I saying here? The whole corporate grind is an entire scam in and of itself! I mean, that’s why you’re here, isn’t it? You want to escape the 9 to 5 job and make a full time income from home. You’re sick of being a corporate slave and want the freedom to work from home. Anyway, it’s important to know what you’re getting yourself into. Look, I want you to succeed. I want you to build an online income and earn cash the lazy way. I’d hate to see you waste your own time, as much I’d hate to see myself waste mine. After all, we’re in this together. We’re gonna achieve success as procrastin8rs and say together fuck getting a real job. So, in order to succeed in this whole online money-making thing, you have to be aware of what a scam looks like. After all, if you can avoid wasting your time in a scam, then the time you spend *trying* to make money online will be actually...profitable, because you’ll know you’re using a legit site or app. Look, I’ve been making money online for nearly a decade now, and believe me, I’ve seen a lot of bullshit. I mean A LOT of bullshit. I’ve learned the ins and outs of the methods these scammers use to try and steal your time for ad revenue, collect your data for their own monetary gain, or just flat out rip you off. My bullshit detector is sensitive and I’m able to recognize when a scammer is lurking behind a flashy, appealing design of a website/app. But I’m going to save you the time of literal years of experience in online money-making by sharing with you today how to spot a scam. I wasted my time so you don’t have to. I got scammed so you can avoid falling in the same trap. Now I could put together a list of names of these scams so you can definitely avoid them, but honestly there are just too many to list. I may provide a few examples, especially if they’re still around, but I’m too lazy to gather every app or website I’ve ever been scammed by. Many of them are already offline. They got their paycheck, packed their bags, and headed off. And while there are some scams still around, it’s only a matter of time before they close too, or reopen with a different name more accurately stated. See, because fact of the matter is, scams are ALWAYS going to be out there. When one closes, another soon opens its doors. So not only is creating a list of scams more work/research than I’m willing to do, it’s also quite impractical. It would have to be a list that kept growing bigger and bigger every day. You don’t want to have to keep checking back on the list as much as I don’t want to have to keep updating it. So rather than making a list of “scams to avoid”, I instead did the lazy thing for us BOTH, by writing “how to avoid scams in the first place”. I basically compiled here today a set of red flags to look out for when it comes to making money online. Once you know what red flags to look out for, you’ll be on your way to making money successfully, as you’ll be able to avoid the types of places that’ll have you make money rather UNsuccessfully, to say the least. So here it is another ProcrastiN8r List! Eight top red flags to look out for to avoid online money-making scams. And without further ado, let’s dive...right into it! RED FLAG #1: If It Sounds Too Good to be True, It Probably Is It’s an old saying, one in which I personally wish I listened to, but it’s true. If you’re being offered riches for seemingly nothing, then there’s probably a catch. And the catch in this case is wasting your time and/or money or even exposing your personal information. There are apps out there that promise to send you hundreds of dollars directly to your PayPal account just by downloading a few games, for example. Sounds enticing. But ya gotta think, what company is going to pay you a couple Benjamins just for a single download? You’re not reviewing it. You’re not testing it for bugs. You’re just downloading it with a click of a button. No business person in their right mind is going to pay THAT much for a single download. You’re not that important. Other sites, like TuneGaGa (SCAM) offer upwards to 40 cents PER video you watch. Like c’mon now get real. No marketer, advertiser, or indie artist in the world, ever, is going to place that much value on a single view on their video. I mean I know you like to think of yourself as some sort of deity, but I’d hate to break it to you, your view ain’t worth that much. It’s just not. Cut dry and simple. I’ve seen it before over and over. These sites will offer high-paying rates to watch videos BUT in order to qualify to watch videos, you need to pay a membership fee. These membership fees can run you up to hundreds if not thousands of dollars. It’s nothing but an elaborate ponzi scheme, disguised as some sort of VIP membership. There is no membership. You’re putting funds into a ponzi and getting paid by people that paid into the ponzi after you. You can earn FREE MONEY online, including by downloading games in legit paying apps like Mistplay, PlaySmart, and Cash Alarm. Likewise, you can watch videos on sites like Swagbucks and InstaGC to make money. It’s true. But it ain’t gonna make you rich. Not by any means. Not by any stretch of the imagination. Not even close. But it can be easy money. Easy money, however, is never LOTS of money. Keep that in mind when you get excited about the marketing schemes that tell you can be rich by playing games or taking surveys or whatever sort of task these apps/sites have you do. RED FLAG #2: The Minimum Cash Outs Are Way Too High Apps that legit pay usually have a cash out minimum of $20 or less. Often, as low as $1. Any of these sites or apps that require something like $50, $100 or even more to cash out are really just trying to get you to waste your time and earn ad revenue off of the time you do spend on the app/site. These clever little sleeze balls will have you earning like $10 per game download on your phone. And you’ll be thinking “Wow, I’ll be rich in no time.” But then reality will smack you in the face. Because what happens is once you reach about $90 in your account balance, then you start earning 1-2 cents per game download. And lo and behold the cash out threshold is $100. You literally have to download hundreds of games to reach that. Usually these high cash out thresholds have you WATCH ADS in order to cash out. Now legit apps do have you watch ads to EARN, but never to cash out. And it’s just like “ph watch this one quick ad to get your cash out.” Oh no! You have to watch dozens upon dozens of ads to “prove you’re real”. Yeah, prove you’re a real idiot for falling for their scam. Face it, it doesn’t matter how many ads you watch, you’re never getting paid. Maybe they’ll pay. Maybe they won’t, but they set the cash out threshold so high and make the requirements to cash out so ludicrous (like watching hours worth of ads) in hopes that you just give up and never cash out anyway. They probably wouldn’t pay you even IF you did jump through all the hoops. But they can just throw out the “the user didn’t meet the minimum requirements” card to cover their asses because they’re banking on the fact you’ll call it quits before you ever reach that point where they would be obligated to pay you anything. The Google Play Store is full of these shady apps and it sucks that Google, being such a big company and trusted brand name allows shit like that all over their store. Just be aware that if the cash out is close to the numbers of a regular pay check from a “real job”, it’s a friggin scam and a half, man. RED FLAG #3: If They Use “Reviews” to Vouch for their Legitimacy, They’re Probably NOT Legit It’s pretty common for a company to brag about their 5 star rating or even use customer testimonials to vouch for their product or service, but there’s a fine line between wanting customers to verify the quality of what you offer and using it as a ruse. If the company seems a little *too* pushy about how their customers feel about them, well either they’re really insecure or trying to hide something (like the fact that they’re a scam). It’s okay to mention that people love your product/service, but really going over the top about it is a sure red flag. Look, people love us. Look, people trust us. You should love and trust us too. It’s the same tactic psychopaths use to lure people into trusting them. Use other people’s trust to gain trust. Don’t fall for that bullshit. It’s manipulative. This also leads us to FAKE reviews. Scam companies will use bots or even hire people to write glowing reviews for them. You gotta read the reviews. Do you see a pattern in how they’re written? While they may not be exactly copy/paste, they may be using AI like quillbot to reword reviews or use the old fashioned method of using a thesaurus to replace words with similar words. Something you gotta look out for in spotting a fake review. Does it even sound human? There’s a certain language that real people use in conversation, yet alone reviews online. There’s a certain cadence and dialect people use. Robots can’t seem to pick it up. It quite simply doesn’t sound...natural. For example, “This is the most amazing app I have ever had the pleasure of downloading. I’m so glad that I have found it. It brings me great joy!” has artificial tone written all over it. Okay. Let’s break that down. Like.. No actual person speaks like that, especially about a friggin mobile app or online website. Do people a little *too* passionate about how awesome the app/website is? A lot of fake reviews come across as a “love letter” of sorts, as if they’re courting their soulmate, not reviewing a freaking app/website. “This is truly the most incredible website I ever had the opportunity to find.” a fake review may read. Like, you also see how that sounds generic, like it could pertain to *any* website or app, not just the one you’re looking at. Be careful of reviews that are too generic sounding as well. RED FLAG #4: If You Have to Spend Money to Earn Money, You Probably Won’t Earn Anything If you have to pay for any sort of subscription or membership, if you have to purchase “ad packs” to qualify for PTC (paid to click) ads, then I can almost guarantee you that you’re looking at a scam point blank. Now there are a few exceptions to this rule. For example, Better Bits Club is a PTC that requires you to purchase ad packs to earn, but they have been paying for nearly half a decade and still going. That’s a very rare exception though and in most cases, paying up front means giving away your money to scammers. And sure, they MAY pay you back *some* of your money. But any day they can just decide to stop paying. You don’t want to take that risk. Most money-making methods that I use online are FREE to earn. You don’t have to pay to be a member or any sort of hidden fees to make money. You can start for free and can always earn for free. I mean imagine applying for a job and they tell you that you have to put a deposit down in order to be an employee. They promise that your paycheck will more than compensate for the upfront fee you pay. You’d be like “Get the fuck outta here. You ain’t takin’ my money!” Well, it’s the same thing with these online businesses. Don’t let them tell you that you have to PAY money to MAKE money. That’s not how it works RED FLAG #5: Support? Psh, You’re On Your Own Kid One simple way to spot a scam is simply send an e-mail to their support/customer service. Do they get back to you? I mean, does a HUMAN get back to you. I’m not talking about some automated response. Of course, you’re going to get an automated response. But, does a person answer your question? If not, then you can pretty much write it off as a scam completely. No legitimate company is going to ignore communication from their current or even potential clients. Now I understand that some start up companies (who are NOT scams) don’t have the proper systems in place to effectively handle all the support requests coming in, but I’d say if you still have no reply after a full week, a full week, seven days, that’s plenty of time to get back to you, then they’re probably not ever going to give you any sort of reply and like I said, you can write it off as a scam. A real company wants to talk to clients; they want to answer questions. They’re not going to ignore you. Slow support is one thing. No support is another. I’m a bit of a sloth myself, so I like to take it slow and I’m a it forgiving when it comes to support taking a while to get back to me. However, I ain’t gonna tolerate absolutely NO reply at all. That means I’m out. Look, if you can’t get a hold of support, that’s such a blaring red flag. Out of all the companies I’ve gotten scammed by in my years of online money-making, I’d say a solid 100% of them lacked any sort of support. And by the way, I should mention that many of these companies will have active support for a while, but then one day just disappear. So let me throw you this: if they stop answering support questions, it’s only a matter of time before they stop paying as well (if they haven’t already stopped already, because chances are you’ll be reaching out about a missing payment). Damn, I’d go as far as to say if you have to reach out to support about a “Missing Payment”, you already know you’re not going to get an answer and you already know it’s a scam. RED FLAG #6: Lack of Updates and/or Social Media Presence means Lack of Pay Outs If the website hasn’t been updated, no news, no word on social media, nothing for I’d say over a month, then you’re looking at a scam right there. No legit company is going to disappear like that ever. Legit companies want to have an active presence online. The online space is so important when it comes to marketing and customer relations, as well as brand building, that there’s no reason a legit company would ever forgo that all of a sudden. Silence speaks loudly and says “WE’RE A SCAM AND NOT PAYING ANYONE ANY MORE!” Seriously, every single one of these scams, and I mean that, every single one, either deletes their social media accounts or stops posting updates all together, including on their own website. While I myself find myself guilty of lacking the social media game, as you can see clearly, I keep the site updated and fresh with new content. Whether it’s blog posts, news, replies on the in-house forum, *something*, there should be a set of regular updates, I’d say at least once a month, minimum. Otherwise, this demonstrates the company is inactive and being inactive means they took the money and ran. RED FLAG #7: Asks for a LOT of Info Before Paying Out It’s common practice for even legit companies to ask for a name, e-mail address, and maybe phone number, but anything beyond that should be approached with extreme caution. Oftentimes, scammers will use this as a method to gather your data and sell it (or possibly use it for identity theft). Be extra careful when you have to fill out your address or other personal information. While you almost can’t avoid at least providing your e-mail/phone, I’d recommend using a burner e-mail and burner phone number (you can get a free one from Google Voice) just to be used with these apps -- that way your name is never tied to your main email address and phone number. You can even go as far as making an alt account for your social media. Scam apps will ask for a bunch of information about you immediately upon signing up, like even your current residential address or picture of your ID. They might as well be asking for your social security, bank pin, and Driver’s License number at that point. It’s kind of like the creepy dude who wants to know where a girl lives before he even knows her name. Now that said, there are legit apps that require your full name and address and other seemingly confidential information. JustDice, for example, has a range of apps that pay you to download and play games and are all 100% legit. They do ask for Face ID using your phone’s camera to verify you're a real person and receive a cash out. So while it’s not a complete red flag here to be asked personal information, it’s still something to be wary about. Do your research and know who you’re sharing your information with before making that decision to actually share it. A simple Google search is all you need to do and see if the company is someone you can trust with your personal info. RED FLAG #8: They Say They’re NOT a SCAM All liars will tell you they never lie. All cheaters will tell you they will never cheat. And all scammers will tell you they will never scam. Seriously, think of major brands and trusted companies like Amazon, Google, McDonald’s Coca-Cola. You don’t see them advertising how they’re not a scam. They don’t have to. Because they aren’t a scam. It’s a simple as that. See, a company with any amount of legitimacy to it doesn’t need to sell to you the fact that it’s not a scam. They don’t have to state that at all. They just go about doing their business and in doing so, it becomes very clear that they aren’t a scam. You know why? Because they aren’t! And they ain’t gotta justify it either. In a legitimate company’s natural practice of business, they’re not going to scam you and they don’t have to say it. Imagine you go to a store and the minute you walk in the cashier says to you “Don’t worry we’re not gonna scam you.” You’d be like “What?” Then they say “We’re not going to use facial recognition to track you and your buying habits then sell your data to other merchandisers.” You’d be like “yo, I’m gettin’ the fuck outta here.” Then go call the cops or something. The same principle applies to online business and not just brick and mortar. Saying you won’t do something is sketchy af. It should raise your eyebrows of suspicion whenever a company mentions to you that they’re not trying to rip you off. Like if a salesman walks up to you and says they aren’t going to try and rip you off, doesn’t that make you think they’re going to *actually* try and rip you off? It’s nothing but a pathetic lie and of course our final big red flag Wrapping Up There you have it. The ProcrastiN8 top red flags to look out for to avoid online money-making scams. I hope you find it useful and can begin avoiding the loads of wastes of time that are out there. Now that you know what to look for, you’ll be less likely to fall victim to a scam and can instead find legit earning methods on your own. The time you save not getting scammed is time you can use to sleep, play video games, or do whatever you want. Stay lazy, my friend and make that money from the couch. Take it easy, N8 Well, fellow procrastin8r, yesterday was Election Day in America, the day to line up at the poll booths and fill out your ballots and choose one of your wonderfully elected officials.
Wonderfully...as if! It’s more like picking between two piles of shit if you ask me. There’s nothing wonderful about the two party system or the politicians that head for offices. It’s the same corporate sponsored agenda, with different colors. Red, blue, left, right, it doesn’t matter, both parties are the same. They both want to bow down to the companies that fat fill their wallets. Of course, one party advertises themselves as the party “for the people” of the working and middle class, but even they, namely the Democrats, are just as corrupt, if not more so, then their Republican brothers. And that’s all it is: branding and advertisement. Look at companies like McDonald’s and Burger King -- they both sell burgers, but they brand themselves with a certain image and roll out ads in order to lure in customers and confirm that sale. Likewise, the Republican and Democrat parties brand themselves with a certain image and roll out (campaign) ads to lure in citizens and confirm that vote. Everything these politicians accomplish, even if if it does *seemingly* benefit the average person living in this county, is only achieved because it furthers the agenda (and thus profits) of their corporate sponsors. There’s a trail of money to be followed. Legalized marrijuana,for example, happened not because these politicians have any interest in giving the American people the freedom to choose what they consume. They couldn’t care less what you or I think. The only reason marrijuana has been legalized is because there’s profit to be made in the marrijuana industry. That’s it. Believe me, it has nothing to do with respecting the rights and freedoms of citizens and it has everything to do with respecting the wants and wishes of the companies that pay their salary. Unless you’re giving a politician millions of dollars, then your voice, or vote, doesn’t really matter much in this whole thing. You’re as relevant to the electoral process as an ant is relevant to a whole forest. Now, this isn’t some sort of political commentary blog, nor do I intend to make it out to be one, but given it was Election Day recently, I want to make a relevant post about that. The focus here will of course be on the Lazy Mindset and how it's important to be lazy as your civic duty to your country. And without further ado, let’s dive...right into it! The Illusion of Free Choice You go in the poll booth and have the quote on quote “freedom” to choose an official you think is fit to hold a position in office. It’s more like a choice of “who do I want to screw me over”? Am I right? There really isn’t much of a choice here. A lot of people feel like they’re picking between “the lesser of the two evils evils”. Like okay, any system that has me choosing between Evil A or Evil B is corrupt at the very core. I mean, fuck! How ‘bout this? How bout I don’t want evil? Like at all. I don’t want the “lesser” of evils either. No evil. Yet that’s the common consensus: you have the freedom to choose between who you think will fuck over you, and the rest of the country for that matter, a bit less than the other. Seriously, what kind of backwards logical modern civilization accepts that as a practical way of doing things? Like I don’t want to pick evil, at any level. I want good. Good for people. Good for the country. Good for everybody. You know it’s bad when pretty much anyone who says they voted says “Well I don’t really support either candidate. I just picked the one I thought wasn’t as terrible.” C’mon man, that’s just sad. How is that acceptable? People aren’t voting for who they *actually* want. They’re voting for the person they feel like they “have to” . The two-party system is a long outdated practice . It really doesn’t allow for *real* people to run for office. We’re left with the sleaze bags who will do anything to raise their paycheck, even if that means signing in a policy that completely ruins society at large. Unless that candidate is backed by big corporate sponsors, he or she just doesn’t stand a chance in getting a few votes, yet alone winning the election. Sure, there are other parties, like the Libertarians and the Green Party, but never in the course of U.S. history has such a party won an election. Ever. It’s impossible for the little guy to gather enough votes in the election to be put into a position of power. Money is power. And unfortunately, because money basically determines the results of the election, or very well the top candidates anyway, only those who are willing to sacrifice their human decency for money are going to get a shot at being on the election ballot. So what can you choose, as a lazy man? Conservative? Liberal? It doesn’t really matter. Just be a dude with an opinion. There’s this sort of tribal war in the United States. In fact, it seems like quite an ironic joke that we call ourselves the “United” States. We’re not very united at all. In fact, this country has never been divided. We're divided by race, by sexuality, by gender pronouns, by left or right, by all these seemingly inconsequential things. When at the end of the day, [ everybody is just another dude with an opinion]. We’re so focused on what separates us, what keeps us apart, that we ignore or turn a blind eye to the things that keep us together, that actually unite us as the United States. And that’s exactly what these people in power want. That’s exactly what the corporate lobbyists who are paying their way to put in place policies that only expand their riches - they want us fighting amongst ourselves, rather than against them. After all, if we’re too busy shouting at each other, then we have no energy left to rise up against our real oppressors -- the greedy corporate billionaires. Race, gender, whatever - these are all but a ruse to keep us too busy to actually insist on change that would be worthwhile, like redistributing the wealth being hoarded by DRAGONS *ahem* corporate owners. Fighting over race, gender, sexuality, and all that is just drama. And life of a lazy man is a drama free zone. It’s extra effort and exerting extra effort is not something a lazy person wants to participate in. Sit back, relax, and listen to what other people have to say. Ya know, have a real conversation, rather than regurgitating talking points of your favorite news host or screaming insults at each other, calling each other names like “tradcon, feminazi, and libtard.” This accomplishes two things. For one, it allows others to air their points of view and actually be heard. For another, it lets you say your own piece without being misunderstood. Understanding is key to building a relationship, and very well the key to building a collaborative society of people. It’s not necessarily about agreeing, but about having a mutual understanding of where the other person is coming from. That’s what rebuilds relationships and that’s what can rebuild this country. But what do I know? I’m just a lazy dude and I don’t study politics. Debates need to be replaced with discussion forums. Arguments about politics should turn into an interesting exchange of ideas. We, collectively, need to be open to hearing different opinions than our own, rather than locking ourselves away in an echo chamber, where all you hear is your own opinions bouncing back to you. And that becomes so easy in the age of social media. You’re not seeing the news. You’re seeing YOUR news, the type of news that supports YOUR views. You're seeing opinions that align with YOURs. You’re seeing people that agree with YOU. And so when we hear anything different than what this echo chamber repeats back to us, we try to isolate it, rather than welcome it. We all outkast those who are even slightly different than the very particular thoughts and feelings we ourselves have. We have to be open to hearing different perspectives. Again, open, not agreeable. Be willing to sit on back and listen to each other for once. I know, it can be scary, hearing something that doesn’t quite align with the way you see things. But relax, man. Take a deep breath and embrace disagreement. Besides, the world would be very boring if we all think and act the same. Our differences are what makes us human. We’re not droid clones, programmed to regurgitate talking points. We’re actually human and can hold this cool thing called a conversation. Get to know a person and where their coming from. You should try it some time. But seriously, sitting down and talking, not necessarily agreeing but giving a chance to air each other’s points of views goes a long way in re-uniting us as the States. Now back to this whole election thing. What do you do? Who do you vote for as a procrastin8r? Who do you choose on the ballot? Well, you can choose to stay on the couch. You can choose not to give a fuck. Or as George Carlin said “On election day, I stay home.” The choice is pretty much made for you. As we covered earlier, choosing between “the lesser of two evils” really ain’t much of a choice here. Might as well embrace your laziness and stay the fuck at home during the election. I mean, why waste the effort of getting out of bed, getting dressed, and walking/driving/commuting to the nearest poll booth, only to get screwed no matter who you vote for or whether you even vote in the first place? It’s a lose, lose, lose situation here. You’re really getting fucked either way. And people may say “well you can’t complain if you don’t vote.” Well, of course I can complain! YOUR the one who voted for them, while I chose not to vote for ANY evil, lesser or not. I get to complain about their shit all I want. Now to clarify her, I do vote, personally, and perhaps that may be a bit hypocritical of me to say that, but I wholeheartedly agree with that sentiment anyway. Fuck elections. They’re corrupt as shit, watery, gooey shit too at that! A random solution? Now before we wrap up, I want to introduce perhaps a bit of a solution to the whole electoral process and government-running as a whole. There’s something called a Democratic Lottery. A Democratic Lottery is where citizens are chosen at random, sort of like the jury selection, then given the opportunity to meet together and discuss public policy and come up with solutions. You have different people from all different places who hold different beliefs, picked in a “lottery” of sorts, in order assures there’s no echo chamber and there is actually a difference of opinion. Now what does this achieve? Why would this be better? Well, you have real people, with real opinions, sharing their real beliefs. You no longer have fake politicians with false promises, who have the ulterior motive to satisfy their corporate donors. We eliminate the corporate bastards from the system and replace it with, well going back to the whole understanding thing, people trying to understand one another and doing what’s best for society. They have genuine concerns and not fabrications to justify profits. If there’s a way to actually give the power back into the hands of the people, instead of these corporate lobbyists, then I’d vote for that! Take it Easy, N8 |
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March 2022
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