Principled Money Posts #56: ‘…in honour of Sigmund Freud’ edition

The other evening I gave a colleague and a friend a lift back from work. We were sitting in the car, shielded from the elements and once we stopped discussing research methods and their relative strengths we moved onto the things that matter in life.

We started talking about the weekend!

‘My son and I are doing our karate grading this Sunday.’ – I said.

‘You do karate with your son?’ – she asked.

‘Yeah, we have great time practicing together. A lot of teenage angst is worked out while sparing.’ – I replied.

‘Maria, you are crazy!’ – she said with certain level of admiration.

 

This reminded me. Do you know who is the guy on the picture above?

Yep, it Sigmund Freud. The reason I got to take this picture is that when visiting Vienna for a conference recently, I was put in the hotel’s ‘Freud Suit’. It was a nice room, as most of the Viennese hotels offer.

What was more interesting was the reaction of my colleagues to me telling them that they should phone me in the ‘Freud Suit’ to call me for dinner. Raucous laughter and muted ‘how appropriate’ comments.

Most of the colleagues I told where I am staying are also friends. Not only, most of them have used me as their ‘creative’ at some point or other. So they can be forgiven for implying I’m crazy.

Still, I seem to be getting a bit of reputation. Do I mind?

Not at all. My craziness is inseparable from my creativity and without the latter I’ll be completely lost.

Do you know who Freud is? If not, you can always Google it. Just don’t believe that he was obsessed with Eros, with our strive for s*xual love. He created a theory – psychoanalysis – that was much cleverer than that.

In honour of Freud, this time I’ll give you only articles that can reality change the way you see the world.

I’ll begin with an old friend of mine; Marie who writes for Prairie Eco Thrifter. She published a letter to her children and grandchildren. It is deeply meaningful, it is poetic and it is about what matters in life: relationships with others, enjoyment of the world around and the wonder of existence and the change of generations. This letter is about life and leaving legacy.

I told you about Althucher Confidential, didn’t I? I still read the site with pleasure and pine after reading every article: I can’t wait for the next and envy anyone who has not read this one yet. The article I’d like to mention to you, my reader, today is about the things James learned while daytrading millions of dollars. The main message of the article is in the last thing learned: it’s never about the money. It is about acceptance, patience, doing rather than only hoping, relishing uncertainty, and being able to say ‘no’. No it’s not about the money; it is about laughter, health and being happy. Money is just something that goes with all these things.

Another favourite of mine is Seth Godin. Most days, I get up, brush my teeth and go to Seth Godin’s site for wisdom, provocation and inspiration. Today, I’d like to tell you about a thought provoking article he published on ‘the moderation glitch‘. This sounds fancy but it is very simple indeed and it is something we all know: there comes a time when more doesn’t make it better. Quite the reverse, more can make things so  much worse. There is always an optimal point at which we get the maximum returns for particular action; after that its effectiveness starts going down. For instance, for bad behaviour school children get detention (they have to stay as school after lessons). This probably has some positive effect when sparsely used and the transgression is serious enough. But couple of weeks ago, my son got detention for forgetting his carrot! Yep, they had cooking lessons and he forgot to take in a carrot. This made him laugh so hard that all future detentions are likely to be taken in a similar light hearted way. Problem is, we never know where is the point where the returns start to diminish; so we are destined to under- or over shoot.

This time I’ve saved the best for last. I’ve always liked Paula Pant from Afford Anything: she is smart, she can write and she certainly does things and goes places. Recently she published an article that made so much sense to me that it stopped me in my tracks: it is about the nexus of freedoms. Let me explain.

One thing I’ve always admired about Paula is that she has a very clear message: money is not to buy things, it is to buy choices. Simple and strong! I also happen to agree whole heartedly with this.

In the article I’d like you to go and read – the one about the three freedoms – Paula takes this a step further. Ultimately, she implies, wealth is not measured by the amount of money you have but by whether or not you have achieved three freedoms: debt freedom, location freedom and financial freedom. The first one is self explanatory; the second one is about organising your life so that you can spend time anywhere on the planet when you wish; and the third one is about, as I call it, not having to be employed.

Have you heard about homophilly? This is about our natural tendency to like people like us and to appreciate writing (and ideas) most similar to our own. This is it! Go read Afford Anything.

Announcements

I am very happy to tell you that The Money Principle has finally graduated to PR4. This is wonderful news and we are very happy; as I explained to some academic colleagues of mine, getting to PR 4 is like getting a Senor Lectureship in the UK, or getting on the tenure track in the US – it rocks.

Also, if you have missed my guest post on the Yakezie website please go and read it: it is for bloggers but I believe that there are things in it that will benefit any writer.

During the last couple of weeks, The Money Principle has been included in the following carnivals:

Fin. Carn. for Young Adults at Degrees and Debt
Yakezie Carnival at www.yourmoneymentor.com
Carn of MoneyPros at Money Pros
Lifestyle Carnival at Cough up the Dough

Carnival of Retirement at Investing Five Daily
Yakezie Carnival at Growing Money Smart
Aspiring Blogger Fin. Carnival at Aspiring Blogger
Carn of MoneyPros at Money Pros
Carn Financial Independence at Carnival of Financial Independence
Carn. of Fin. Camaraderie at Micro’s Missions
Lifestyle Carnival at Hurricanes, Panties

This is all for now; good night and speak soon.