[Previous entry: "Go cry yerself to sleep on your giant oversized pillow"] [Next entry: "Curse of the hot *spot*"]
05/02/2005: "What would you do if...?"
I was bitching today about how I can’t afford a new outboard for my sailboat. It’s from 1977 and ½ the time I can’t even get it started. It happens at the worst possible times, trust me, you don’t want to be floating powerlessly towards a million dollar boat or a pile of rocks. Either way, it’s a lose/lose scenario.
So the conversation went something like this:
Me “I hate not having money”
She “you have a ton of money by world standards, excuse me if I don’t feel sorry for your not being able to afford a new outboard for your sailboat when there are people starving all over the world”
Me “O.K, I’m an ass”
I know there will always be people better and worse off than me. I tend to compare myself to only those better off which isn’t healthy. On a related topic, I have 2 questions I sometimes ask myself to sort of take stock with where I’m at in life:
1. What would I be doing today if I only had a year left to live?
2. What would I be doing today if I suddenly came into 50 million dollars?
It’s a way of accessing where I’m at, for example: Where would I want to live? Would I keep my current job? Would I spend more or less time in the studio? etc.
If too many of my answers are far off from where I’m at today, I start thinking about how I can make adjustments so that I’m taking an active, rather than passive, roll in my life.
It’s interesting that what I’d do in scenario #1 is totally different than what I’d do in scenario 2. For example, in scenario 1 I probably wouldn’t change much in my current life…ie. Keep the same house and job, probably spend more time in the studio, take more vacation time to visit friends and family etc. In scenario 2 I’d change a lot, almost everything in fact. Well, for one thing…I’d probably buy a new outboard for my sailboat!