The top principle in life...

(Click on the title of this post to read the entire post.)

Life is about "spending scarce resources to do the most good".  Yet, we fail to step up to the higher perspective that will allow us to orchestrate an incredible life, one accessible to virtually anyone.

When we squander those scarce resources, for whatever falsely believed reason or just "mindlessly", we squander life - our own AND the lives of others.

Indeed, there is a whole science devoted to what will make our lives the best.

It is "economics", which is a social science that happens to have as a part of it financial elements - but it is actually about life, for its purpose is to "maximize utils in life" (a "util" is a unit of life value).  Economics is not about money (except as a possible means for buying good).  It is about maximizing happiness and its components (fulfillment, satisfaction, etc.). (See Economics - The Philosophy - The Maximization For Units Of Satisfaction".)

Stepping above it all and taking a world view, we see The Gates Foundation choosing, with the scarce resources it has, to do those things with the greatest impact in the world.   (It is doing more good by far than the foreign aid budgets of the wealthy nations.)  Consider the way of thinking and allocating scarce resources in the article by "economist" Bjorn Lomborg in Learning From Bill Gates.

(Read that piece at least, even if you do not read the rest of this post.)


A WORLD "ASLEEP"

We have been a world "asleep" to doing what creates the most good.  We have been in a political correctness group-"think" hypnosis that is quasi-religion like, where we operate from "right/wrong" moralistic thinking instead of rationality and ethics - where we lose sight of what was our original good intent.

The world is now waking up.  And I hope each person, as a unit of the world, also "wakes up" to see that they are not doing the most good for their own good, individually and collectively.

Countries are becoming "nationalistic", which is labelled by some as being politically incorrect ("bad", "evil").  However, all it is is people feeling the pain of lack of sufficient well-being (including financial and also safety) and no longer being willing to put up with it anymore.  It's complex.  It's like in the movie Network where people (many of them now labelled as "deplorables") lean out of their windows in a mass movement and say "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to put up with it anymore!!!". 

While there is a lot of dust ginned up by this, it is a move toward better thinking, to making disciplined decisions with regard to creating the most positive impact per amount of dollars spent.

While I wish for you to "get" the idea of spending your time "as if " it is the scarce "currency of life", I hope that you use the lessons learned from the slide down into non-thinking, where we failed to address how to best allocate resources (sliding instead into wasteful politics, political correctness, useless battles, personal ineffectiveness, a slide into more widespread depression and much more anxiety....).

For too long, we have allowed, in the U.S., the following to continue, with only political rhetoric and few results.  Donald Trump is the main advocate for change, which is good, and a powerful results producer, unfortunately with a number of negatives of not yet determined consequence - in general, however, he is likely to cause much more progress (and disturbances) instead of maintaining the status quo.

These are a few:

Very low rated educational results (how can we justify sticking to the status quo??? - this especially harms poor people and minorities.)

Not fixing the inner cities and the violence and poverty of those stuck in the "poverty culture", particularly African Americans, with the highest crime rate of any group.

A porous border causing economic dislocation and loss of jobs, allowing a huge flow of drugs and potential entry of terrorists with weapons of mass destruction.  It's obvious, but political correctness covers it over.  (People even refuse to call illegal immigrants by name, equating them with just being immigrants - amazing!)

Shipping jobs overseas (where we need to change the structures and incentives and stop blaming companies for making economic decisions for the good of their shareholders; hoping for the good fairy to descend upon us to change our behavior is not likely to work!).

Huge trade deficits beyond the benefits of trade.

An entitlement mentality that leads to fewer productive citizens (and to their own detriment individually).

Unsmart immigration (as opposed to letting in those people based on merit and their benefit to U.S. citizens, similar to Australia's standards)

Unaddressed huge unfunded liabilities (besides the 20 trillion dollars of U.S. national debt an additional 60 to 100 trillion unfunded Medicare and Social Security, as determined by the trustees themselves and officially released - and not in doubt - refusing to address it is an incredibly unethical trap for the future!

The declining health of the people in the U.S....and a broken health care system, without full coverage...

And more...


THE KEY POINT HERE IS NOT "THE DETAILS"

Just scan the details, as we cannot address right now or do any good on any one,  The point here is to gain the perspective and to stop denying the slide in the world, but more importantly, first, in one's own individual life.

It all begins (and in a sense, ends) with your individual benefit.  It is time to stop glossing over (even denying) the wasteful spending of life on so many things of low value (with many actually being harmful) and to vehemently and ruthlessly take control of the reins to do only that which does the most good with your scarce resource (time, the very currency of your life!!!).

I addressed the life value part of this in my (virtually costless) first book "Life Value Productivity and its supplemental pieces on the the site, such as "Simplified, But Effective Time Management - You Can't Afford Not To Have A Good System!" (or you'll waste much of your life value!).  All of this is about choosing to spend one's life currency (time) on what is of the most value for you in your life. Knowing what is of most life value, of course, is the first key and then having a way to make sure that it is actually installed in your life is the mandatory link to getting the results that can literally transform your lives. (!!!!!!!)

The second piece is gaining the skill of "self control" (as differentiated from "discipline"), so that you are able to direct your energies in any one moment to what is best for you at the moment, instead of some meaningless, primitive, out of date impulse/urge or being engaged in a constant struggle to seek relief (from one's anxiety).  The book on implementing that in a practical, workable way (not just theoretical) will be the second book in the series.  If you're interested in knowing when that is coming out, sign up for this blog (see the email box in the righthand sidebar).  It will be called something like "Smart (and easy) Self Control" - and it will be the most practical, implementable, doable book ever written in the area.  .

Those two books together will more than "10X" your life.

This is what you should work on before you take on any short term projects.  As suggested in the book, drop all lower and medium value activities and cut the bottom 60% out at least, to begin to do that which will most affect your life...for the rest of your life!!

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