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18.9.15

Thoughts on Money-Making it and growing it:

I came across this post from Eric Nelson courtesy of the 5 Bullet Friday posts from Tim Ferris.  Tim is the author of two books I would recommend dipping into:  'The 4 Hour Body' and 'The 4 Hour Work Week'.  Tim also hosts a great podcast called 'The Tim Ferris Show' where he interviews world class performers in sport, business and creativity to determine characteristics they have in common, that we ordinary mortals can then use to develop ourselves into Supermenschen!  See it at http://fourhourworkweek.com/category/the-tim-ferriss-show/

I am also getting into 'You need a Budget' as a means of training myself out of mindless consumerism and profligacy.  I don't fully understand its processes yet but will report back.  You can find more out here:  https://www.youneedabudget.com/


George Clason wrote a series of pamphlets in the mid-1920's, which were eventually bound together and published under the name The Richest Man in Babylon.  


Available on www.amazon.co.uk


Since it was originally a series of pamphlets, the book is composed of short, allegorical stories, all intended to teach readers how to acquire money, how to keep it, and how to use it.  The persistent character in each story is Arkad, the richest man in Babylon, who is often the teller of the stories, describing how he earned that title and drawing attention to relatable truths.

I would suggest studying, from this book, the iconic 5 Laws of Gold:
 I. Gold cometh gladly and in increasing quantity to any man who will put by not less than one-tenth of his earnings to create an estate for his future and that of his family. 
 II. Gold laboreth diligently and contentedly for the wise owner who finds for it profitable employment, multiplying even as the flocks of the field. 
 III. Gold clingeth to the protection of the cautious owner who invests it under the advice of men wise in its handling.
 IV. Gold slippeth away from the man who invests it in businesses or purposes with which he is not familiar or which are not approved by those skilled in its keep. 
 V. Gold flees the man who would force it to impossible earnings or who followeth the alluring advice of tricksters and schemers or who trusts it to his own inexperience and romantic desires in investment. 

Some quotes that have struck me this week:

It is a paradoxical but profoundly true and important principle of life that the most likely way to reach a goal is to be aiming not at the goal itself but at some more ambitious goal beyond it.

Arnold J Toynbee

We succeed in enterprises which demand the positive qualities we possess, but we excel in those which can also make use of our defects.

Alexis De Tocqueville