Priorities

Are you prepared for short term pain to create long term gain?

I’ve had a week of hell. As I write this, it’s Friday night and I’ve amassed 64 hours of work since Monday, and I have another 8 to look forward to on Saturday. There’s all a reason behind it, but I’ve practically been a zombie all week.

I’ve been bordering on a state of complete social isolation and I’ve uncharacteristically resorted to reading shitty trash articles online in an effort to fill my mind with useless nonsense to tide me over until the week is over.

The mind numbing drivel hasn’t had the effect on me that I wanted. My mind is still constantly racing, still constantly analysing, and still constantly planning. How do normal people read this shite, watch their TVs and sleep so soundly at night? Sometimes, I feel that having such an over-active brain is a curse, as well as a blessing.

It lead me to read this article on “10 people who won the lottery and lost it all”.

I couldn’t help but think how people could win such a large amount of money and end up a few years later scrounging around for benefits.

In some ways, I feel a bit naive. Everyone is at the centre of their own universe, and your own habits are what is normal to you. Anything that breaks the mould of your evaluation of life, or anything that acts out of what is the ordinary to you, is wrong. I mean, it’s not wrong per se, but to you it is.

You get desensitised to the things in your life which are completely unique amongst the masses simply because it’s not unique to you. At the same time, with better judgement or not, you may subconsciously believe that your way of thinking or your perceptions of reality are the default mode for everyone else. Anyone who doesn’t think like you think or act how you act is wrong and is alien to the normal standards you’ve set yourself.

“What do you mean you don’t like the Godfather films?!”

When I read the article, I naively thought that if someone won the lottery, no matter how much, that they would be set for life because they would have advisors helping them and would want to plan for the future to make sure they stay wealthy until the end of their days.

And obviously, nobody is thick enough to blow all of their lottery winnings and condemn themselves to poverty, right?!

Apparently so. I brought the subject up at work where, unfortunately, the majority of people are either women or gay. So as far as any red pill views go, they’re as scarce as chicken’s teeth. Eight out of the ten or eleven asked said they wouldn’t worry about investing for their future which didn’t really surprise me; they all possess a short term mentality which is very common these days, and especially so as most I asked were women.

Society is more gluttonous, more hedonistic and more to do with the present these days. People want new information immediately, they want to do everything straight away and not wait or plan things out. The future is the future and is of no concern. I’ll worry about being old when I’m old.

Thankfully, I’m different and always have been.

I always plan forward. It’s part of my extremely active brain, which as I said is a bit of a curse. It leaves me worrying and causes anxiety. But hey, I grew up in the 00s, so although I can see that people want everything now and I can point it out as a major character flaw in my generation, unfortunately, I’m cut from the same cloth having been brainwashed by the many adverts for the latest gadgets that come out every other month. It’s not my best trait, but I have it under control a lot more than most.

For now, planning for my future is my main priority. Everything else in my life is taking a step back to accomodate this one priority I’ve set for myself in the medium to long term.

That priority is to become both financially independent and location independent within the next 3 years. I’m on the cusp of the latter, which will help lead me to the former. It seems absurd to say as it’s normally the other way around, but I’m getting into something that will offer me the chance to work for London salaries outside of London.

I’m soaking up as much information as I can. I’m reading, I’m writing, I’m practicing different methods and it takes up a lot of my spare time. Picking up girls is being put on hold for the foreseeable future, aside from a trip planned next week to Croatia for a few days, so that I can focus on what needs to be focused on.

In terms of financial independence, I’m investing my money in a business. My biggest priority is to save as much money as I can and pump it all into the business so that I can be free of “normal work” and play around with my money as I see fit. All I want to do is to grow it more.

“You lose money chasing women, you never lose women chasing money”

My short term pain, for at least the rest of this year anyway, is working my arse off to save as much money as I can while I have it on tap. I get offered a lot of overtime, hence the ridiculous hours I’ve worked this week, and it’s all going into the investment fund.

Thankfully, from a young age, I’ve been able to see that working for someone else is a fool’s game. I’ve never planned for my life to be like the people around me, and I’ve never seen myself to be that 9-5 worker. Sure, I hate work as much as the next person, but I’m prepared to do something about it.

It’s become increasingly more frustrating for me recently at work. Working for men who are middle aged in middle management that aren’t married is one of the most mentally exhausting things I’ve ever done. It’s grinding on me all the time, but I seek solace in the fact that in 6 months time I’ll be sipping margaritas on a beach. That’s what is keeping me going, and the knowledge that I’ll never be like the people I’m working for. It’s more of a motivation than anything seeing the person you could become if you remain plugged in.

It’s difficult to call yourself a man, although a relatively young one, when you stand up to everything in the world you come across but have to fall in line at work and be muted to keep your job. It makes me feel worthless, hypocritical, and that I’m not being true to myself. It makes me question at times the progress I’ve made when I can’t speak my mind at work and bite my tongue so as to appease the pathetic excuse for a man who holds my “career” in his hand.

I feel targeted at times. I see things for what they really are, and most things in a working environment are completely pointless and trivial. This attitude pours out of me at work, and although there is no issue with anything I do in terms of the quality of my work and ability, it’s frowned upon because I’m not the drone they want me to be.

I’m outcasted, I’m seen as a special case that requires monitoring because of my personality. Again, it’s nothing to do with my work. I’m very good at what I do. In fact, my stats and my appraisal last month for the last 6 months indicate I’m the second highest performer out of a team of 35. It’s purely down to the fact that I’m outspoken and don’t treat people as anything special regardless of their job title.

When people see something in you that they can’t be, or that your outlook on life or overall makeup makes them question themselves, then they will give you grief. It’s especially not a particularly good thing to make someone in a position with a bit of power to be forced to look at themselves through just being yourself.

“Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities.”

It’s one of the bitter sides to taking the red pill and is something I’m sure we all struggle with; being forced into the blue pill mindset and wanting to break free without being able to. I mean, I could, but it would be a particularly stupid thing to do given that at this stage of my life, I need to have a job.

This is my short term pain for now. As much as I hate it, it’s my priority. There is a bigger picture, there is a grand scheme, there is a means to an end, and thankfully they are all in my thoughts constantly to remind me why I need to get up out of bed and stick on a shirt and tie.

If you told me in January I had to shovel horse shit 8 hours a day, 5 days a week for a year and at the end of that year I’d have the financial and location independence I want, I’d bite your arm off.