How To Stay 'Young, Dumb and Broke'
Or, 10 Ways To Hold Yourself Back From Experiencing a Prosperous Life.
Friday evening, I needed to escapeâââto distract myself a bit from all the things still undone, incomplete for the week.
When youâve made the choice to practically live on the internet, sometimes a small slice of time away from the screen is so, so needed.
But, last Friday, an hour eating a 100% all-natural burger (what really is that, by the way?) at this new hip cafÊ in a college town near me⌠it turned into two, then three, then⌠argh!, four.
I found myself meeting up with some friends at, of all places, one of those dark, seedy, disco dance clubs; a throw back to New York Cityâs Studio 54 with the wholesomeness of current-day Southern Oregon conservative chill/
(In other words, no garbage bags of money and dope stashed in rugs throughout the club).
This is something I rarely doâââseek out a place outside my home to decompress, to get into a music stupor, with social drinking as the sedative. But, like anything that gets too out of whack (including how much you spend working), Life in all its infinite wisdom will just help you find the opposite experiences to âbalanceâ your shit out!
(Some thoughts about the Law of Polarity, the duality of Lifeâââi.e., in-out, yes-no, on-off, courage-fear, love-hate, light-dark, etc.âââsome other time. Or here, if you must)
So, just after midnight, DJ-Chuck spins up Khalidâs song (which this post is titled), and these lyrics nearly made me smile (slyly) from ear-to-ear:
âJump and we think, leave it all in the game of love
Love
Run into sin, do it all in the name of fun
Fun
Whoa-oa-oa
Iâm so high at the moment
Iâm so caught up in this
Yeah, weâre just young, dumb and broke
But we still got love to give.â* NOTE: If you donât know the song, the official video is here.
Ya see, when I look at how younger generations operate, how they donât engage in certain self-reflective actions or take responsibility for their current financial or lifestyle situation, I wonder silently sometimes:
Was I also like that as a 20-something? Did I really believe delayed gratification is a defect; that occasionally sacrificing (the present pursuit of fun and âhighâ experiences for a near-future payoff of being smart and rich) was a shitty proposition?
That if I could just muster-up enough love in my heart, and enough positive thoughts in my head, all would magically take care of itself? That the restâââsuch as the distasteful hard work to earn money or the personal development skills to keep my girlfriendâââwouldnât be a trade off?
Around 12:30am, after reflecting on those questions for an hour (a few fireballs helped), the biting-truth, an insidious, deeply-buried confession from my past, came to light:
Oh shit⌠ut-oh⌠I didâââyeah, yeah daffy, I did, I did⌠sorta have some of that mindset; certainly more than I have now.â
The idealism of a youthful brain! What a blessing, what a curse!
The ambitious, but inexperienced, brain strives to change the world, to give the âfuck you fingerâ to tradition and time-tested norms, yet it also (as Dr. Jordan Peterson has been eloquently pointing out) conveniently forgets that it has yet to consistently clean its own room.
But, saints, sages and gurus for millennia have been sayinâ the same damn thing.
Ghadi: âBE the change you want to seeâŚâ
Rumi: âYesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.â
Still, the wisdom of experience and timeless study will always be challenged (read: avoided) by impetuousness-innocence and the iconoclastic spirit.
Maybe it should, too!
But, Iâd argue not just for the sake of it. Some conventional things (like religious ideology) DO require hard scrutiny. Then, there are some things (like biology and sexuality; or a quest for gender-oneness) that need to just be left the hell alone.
When you strip it down to its bare bones, personal transformation is the greatest self-inspired challenge of all â kind of hard to push yourself out of your âbox,â if youâre not questioning why you got, or are staying in that comfortable little bastard.
Youâre basically cajoling yourself to fear less, therefore love more; to expand perception of Self, therefore operate daily with enhanced creativity and sustained curiosity.
The curmudgeon saysâŚ
âWhatever⌠I donât give a rats ass. I just live vicariously 4 hours a day watching the Travel Channel. Iâm not harming anybody. Whatâs the point in trying to be a bigger and better person?â
The Pollyanna saysâŚl
âHey, champ⌠I understand your dog got ran over, your girlfriend left, and a burglar stole all your gold coins. Cheer-up, sad face, this will all be for a greater good; something better will come out of this for you, too.â (eh, no shit Captain Obvious).
Whatever extreme youâve latched onto before (I hope, not for long), youâve probably learned (through experience) that being a groupie of any one camp is ultimately a distraction.
In other words, the repressed, unresolved aspect of the opposite extreme lurks within like a villainous monster. Avoid it, run from it, and it just grows larger and more pervasive. Face it, head-on, and âITâ shrinks as YOU grow.
But, do you really have to first be immature, foolish and destitute before you can become accomplished, smart, and prosperous?
Iâm going to dive in Part 2 of this report. Iâll reveal some specific ways Iâve learned (and am still learning) to GROW in order to melt my extreme monsters.
Everything in life, dear reader, if taken to the edges⌠itâs a dangerous spot to be. Holding onto beliefs and viewpoints without employing an open, flexible mind⌠itâs one helluva high-risk proposition, for sure.
I know a guy who is nearly obsessed with whatever CNNâââwhat I like calling Chronic Neurotic Nonsenseâââis reporting about so-called âscandalsâ in politics, or the purported âtruthâ theyâre digging up about âbadâ corporations, or their âexposesâ about the economy.
Heâs so focused on what THEY say is happening, it is as if his entire potential for greater prosperity, and a better personal future, is tied to their version of the outside world⌠like some kind of Puppet Master / Puppet dynamic. I told him if he doesnât change his focus; if he doesnât quit building-up his grand scapegoat, his epitaph is going to say, âIt Was All Their Fault!â
I also know a gal who thinks sheâs so evolved, that all the ânegativeâ things âout thereâ the masses deal in⌠those kinds of gnarly things donât affect her. She is, in her words, âa reflector of darkness and conflictâ because she radiates âso much inner love, peace and joy for herself and her family.â
Yet, sheâs so far-removed from reality, she wonât acknowledge that, at 45, sheâs living rent-free (with no car) on her parentâs farm. The justification, of course, is because they need her presence and nurturing energy.
So, whatâs the bottom-line of being able to fulfill the promise of the title of this post:
If you truly want to stay dumb and broke, here are 10 views of the world, and personal behaviors, which will get you there:
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