Dear Friend,
Unless you just landed from Mars you are quite aware of the recent financial insanity that has descended onto the world. A respected financial newsletter I follow stated that about 40% of the world’s wealth has disappeared. This is hard to understand unless you are an economist, but needless to say it does not bode well for the average person’s immediate future lifestyle.
What actually disappeared was the world’s willingness to part with modern currency (money) in exchange for mechanisms that produce more money (investments). Since all of the financial markets on Earth are connected, when confidence in a big one falls (USA), they all fall down like a house of cards.
I’m not going to try and analyze why all of this happened. Plenty of people much more knowledgeable than me do that every day (and they are probably wrong!). But what I do want to talk about is how you can ensure that future financial debacles do not threaten your wealth.
First, you have to understand what wealth really is. Wealth is the degree to which you can persuade others to do what you want them to do, when you want them to do it. And there are three types of wealth, or of tools that you can use to get what you need from people. They are, in ascending degree of value, as follows: 1) force or threat of force (coercion), 2) tangible assets or money, and 3) knowledge and wisdom.
Coercion is the oldest and least powerful way to motivate others to help you. Yet, it continues to be used everyday by thugs and by governments to make people do things. The actions of thugs are obvious. But be aware that any law has meaning only to the degree that behind it, somewhere, is the image of a policeman and a gun. Government is the application of brute force, plain and simple. At least that’s how George Washington described it.
The second best way to get what you want from people, and the most commonly used today, is to pay them. Employees and independent contractors work for you in exchange for money. Perhaps you work for others for money. “Money makes the world go around,” is the old adage. The big weakness of money is that it has to be “stored” somehow after earning, and maintained. And there are so many ways to lose your money. I like to say that it is ten times harder to hold onto money than it is to earn it. That’s why there are so many high-paid people but so few truly wealthy people. Having a lot of money can be a liability of sorts. And once you have it, you may feel the need to spend it on material things that you never really needed anyway. You may even fall under the common spell that material wealth will bring you happiness.
The best way to get people to do what you want them to do is to utilize knowledge and wisdom. For example, you can use your persuasive powers. Or you can utilize a carefully-crafted skill to earn just enough money at just the right moment. You can then use that newly-created money to get what you want. For these folks, there is no money storage issue. There is no loss of assets in a stock market crash or government mismanagement of the economy. With the power of persuasion and the knowledge and skills to make money on demand, you, in effect, become an ATM. You produce what you need. Like a government, you can (metaphorically speaking of course) print your own money.
It is the third method of persuasion that many people running Internet businesses are attempting to harness. Since the technologies are new, nobody really knows how to make it all work. But most of us in this field implicitly already know what I have just written. And, going into the 21st Century, it is more important than ever to convert your old, paper money into persuasive skills and knowledge. You will be investing in an asset that, at least at this point in history, nobody can steal from you.
So, by all means, order that new Internet wealth course. And attend that seminar on how to better persuade others. It will be the best investment that today’s money can buy.
Thanks for following and all the best,
Hugh
