Sep

2

4 Steps to Destiny

Filed Under Vision 

Sow a thought, reap an act.

Sow an act, reap a habit.

Sow a habit, reap a character.

Sow a character, reap a destiny.

Yoda once phrased this as a foreboding warning to young Vader:

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”

Fear is a thought, which if focused upon, leads to anger, which is an expression of the fear.

Repeated or constant anger results in hate, a habit that results in suffering since it imposes a negative toll on the body.

In Star Wars, young Vader’s hateful character eventually lead him to the dark side - all which stemmed from fear.

While in life, our destinies may not be as dramatic as Vader’s, it may still be as grand, especially to us who are the protagonist of our own life’s story. So how do we take this lesson and develop a desirable destiny?

For me, I have always desired a destiny of freedom, exploration, and experience. So I worked backwards.

1. What Destiny do I want?

To answer this takes much introspection that is built from experience. The greater the experience, and the greater the time spent introspecting on the experience, the clearer your destiny will be to you.  Note that by a “greater” experience, I mean both the quantity and quality (quality * quantity = level of experience value/greatness).  If you do not know your current destiny (I say current, because your destiny may change at any time), then you may need to:

  1. Stop reading this.
  2. Go have great experiences.
  3. Reflect upon them and their meaning in your life.

One day you will fall into destiny’s path.

For me, I have found that my destiny lies in transcending.  What does this mean?  It means breaking barriers, leaving limits, exceeding existence.  But I am constantly looking for the greater challenge to transcend (reminiscent of Street Fighter Ryu’s devotion to spiritual perfection).  What is the current challenge to overcome?  That which currently binds me most.

The only thing that truly binds us in life is time. Happiness is abundant. Money is abundant (especially if you are fortunate enough to be reading this article). Things to do are abundant. Time is the one thing every human has a limited amount of, and in no way can increase. The only thing that we can improve on is how that time is spent. To spend time more effectively, we need to spend time doing the things that really matter most to us.

For the first 10 years of life as a child, we spend it acquiring basic skills. Math, English, walking, running, et cetera. One has very little control over how we spend our time at this stage, since it is mostly dictated by our parents. The fortunate ones will have their time well-managed by their parents, and develop a strong basic skill set at this stage. The unfortunate ones will have to struggle harder to attain a same basic level as their more fortunate counterparts.

For the next 10 years of life as a teenager, we spend it acquiring social skills, self-esteem, and so forth. Here we start to gain more control over our time, but are probably too young to know where to spend it effectively.

The next 10 years of life are spent making that leap to a fully-fledged responsibility of managing one’s own time. For some, this is delayed by college, which eases the transition.

So what happens when the responsibility lies in us to manage our own lives? Well, the first problem that arises is putting food on the table so we can survive and eat. For most, this means jobs, which consumes the next 40, 50 years of life until retirement. Isn’t it ironic that when we are most in control of our time, we typically spend it in an area that does not tie in with our destiny?

Now I know and understand the destiny I wish to achieve, I must understand the character that is needed to achieve that.

2. What Character do I need to achieve my Destiny?

When I was younger, I used to play RPGs (role-playing-games), where you would pick a character such as a warrior, thief, or wizard, and then develop your character to become the strongest warrior, most cunning thief, or powerful wizard in the land.  However, my goal is not to rule over lands, defeat robber-barons, or conjure spells. I wish to be free, and I ascertained that financial freedom is critical to time-freedom. To be financially free, I have found the following basic equation needs to be satisfied:

Money In >= Money Out

Money out can be categorized into two main areas:

a) Essentials
Needed to survive. Food, water, shelter, health care, etc.

b) Luxuries
Comes in two categories: entertainment and upgrades. Entertainment is anything for one’s own personal pleasure but is not essential to surviving. This includes movies, sports, clubbing, etc. Upgrades are upgrades on the essential category. For example, upgrading from McDonald’s to Mastro’s.

Money in typically comes in one of two sources:

a) Active
This is money you work for. You trade hours for dollars. If you are highly skilled, and your skill is in high demand, your hours will be worth a lot of dollars (eg. Lawyer). If you are working in a lower skill-set, your hours will be worth less. For true financial freedom, your active money in can be zero at any time, and you can still maintain your current lifestyle.

b) Passive
This is money that you don’t trade hours for dollars, but still comes in. Sources of this type of income are investments, dividends, and businesses.

Investments and dividends require money to create money, and usually create it at a 5-10%, maybe 20% annual growth rate based off the principal capital.

Businesses also need money to create money, but are often able to create a 20-100% annual growth rate based off the principal capital. This is the beauty of business.

It should be apparent that passive money in is preferable to active money in, since your time is the most-freed up in this case. The lower one can keep their “Money Out”, the faster that “Money In” can push the equation to a state of financial freedom. However, the caveat is that one must have Active Money In = Zero to be financially free, so one must either invest, or have a business generating money in.

Since I am Business Bruce and not Investor Bruce, we have chosen our player character - a business owner.


3.  What habits does a business owner have?

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