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Eventually. . .

Anything related to matters of the mind

mws87

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My posting here has been scarce lately, mainly because I don't want to show my face until I have updates for my progress thread. However, I do occasionally check in to read posts and chat with one of the members on here and a recent discussion we had made me remember a moment I wanted to share with everyone. This may help some or it may just echo what's already known by others.

Through our recent discussion, one of the members here had made mention of a guy in his area using a device to search for gold. It reminded me a lot of the saying(s) regarding searching for gold (instead of digging for gold with everyone else, sell shovels/pans/etc) and also made me wonder about the guy doing the searching - I wonder if he found any gold. . . I wonder how long he's been searching. . . Realistically, I'm sure he hasn't. Meanwhile, the guys who created the machine sure have.
Then, it reminded me of a situation I witnessed first hand, last year.

As I was working at a shitty used-car sales job, I had a customer approach and sit at my desk. He was a tall & lanky, withered old man I recall to be in his 70's who went by Lewis. After some discussion, he made mention of his poor choices and resulting bad credit, thus his current situation of seeking special financing. His income was that of a minor pension and social security and he revealed his main hobby and expense to be playing the lottery as he removed a stack of lottery tickets from a plastic bag along with a notepad containing page after page of numbers scribbled and scratched out.

While I worked on his application I took a peek to what he was doing and noticed he was using his cell phone to check the draw frequency of all the numbers to find the best possible combination to increase his chances of winning that jackpot. Curious, I asked him about his lottery playing history and whether he had ever hit a major winning or not. Not to my surprise, he'd been playing for at least a decade and has won "a couple hundred here and there", and in regards to winning millions he stated "I know I'll win it eventually!"

Keep in mind: this was before I read TMF and it still scared the shit out of me. I don't think I need to go into much detail about utilization of time (what else he could have invested in, etc.) but I will explain what brought me the most dread. It was one word - eventually.

I have a huge, HUGE obsession with time, or rather, preservation of it and recently it has begun to plague me with anxiety here and there. Every time I'm sitting or standing idle I have to look at my watch and observe it's hands slice away those seconds which will never again be regained. What can I do NOW???
The problem I have with eventually is it may never come. Will he ever experience that event? Will he even be able to enjoy it? I don't have to echo TMF too much here for everyone to understand where I'm coming from.

My obsession has actually helped me make better, more efficient choices and has also made the choices of others stand out a LOT more. (example - a guy I worked with was picking up a car from a sister-store, decided to wait 15+ minutes in line to use their car wash instead of driving 5 minutes back to use ours which would have taken him only an additional 5 minutes to do. Yes, it's only 5 minutes, yet it adds up quick.)

The point here is the importance of time investment (I know MJ expands on this A LOT). After meeting Lewis, I never thought about him again until the recent discussion I had on here, and I couldn't hope but help it was worth it for him. I'm assuming, for him, his years were worth those $1 lottery tickets. I always have to ask myself what my time is worth. Is losing it worth sitting around doing nothing? Is it worth putting off progress today for tomorrow? Honestly, no. No it isn't.

Speaking of time, I may have just wasted 10 minutes of it posting this. However, if this helps at least ONE person, I would consider it time well spent. Remember - be careful what you invest your time in; wasted time is worse than wasted money.

/mindless rambling
 
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Guest34764

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As a student in school i use the word "eventually" a lot.I wouldn't call myself super lazy but when it comes to homework i usually put it off till the next day or i'll do the homework the period before. I've been trying to get that word out of my head for a while now and it's ironic because i say that i will eventually get rid of it later.Why not now?Starting now i'm going to completely erase that word from making decisions for me,I won't get rid of it tomorrow or the week after.I'll get rid of it today, right now.I'm going to go do my homework, go practice some coding and all the jazz.The 10 minutes was well spent my man.Thanks.
 

mws87

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As a student in school i use the word "eventually" a lot.I wouldn't call myself super lazy but when it comes to homework i usually put it off till the next day or i'll do the homework the period before. I've been trying to get that word out of my head for a while now and it's ironic because i say that i will eventually get rid of it later.Why not now?Starting now i'm going to completely erase that word from making decisions for me,I won't get rid of it tomorrow or the week after.I'll get rid of it today, right now.I'm going to go do my homework, go practice some coding and all the jazz.The 10 minutes was well spent my man.Thanks.
It happens, man. I'd be lying to everyone here if I claimed to be a time God on some uberman schedule. Although I do still have my moments, they are far less frequent and I'm actually happy when I call myself out on it (most people never realize it). It's crazy to go from being conditioned to think a certain way, live a certain way and act a certain way your entire life to finally waking up one day and start conditioning yourself to do the complete opposite. It's hard as hell sometimes, but I have to remind myself doing it now, whatever it may be, is better than doing it tomorrow, or next week, or next month, or.. ugh.. new years. But I've also learned to know the difference between procrastinating and genuinely needing a break. I'm happy it helped you out in some form or another @Omega

You should post here more often
Thank you @Vigilante (also thanks for the transfer). I appreciate your encouragement and your wisdom through your posts, you got me to go out and buy a bulk pack of legal pads.

I guess I've secluded a bit because I didn't want to be the "shadowy guy" having input on things he has no experience with. I know value is important to all of us here, and I can't express how thankful I am for the awesome community and staff for keeping it that way, so I held back on posting much until I actually had something of value to contribute here. I have actually been laid-up in debilitating pain all day but still managed to do what I could without killing myself which is when the whole post came to mind and I wanted to share the thoughts with people I figured would understand, this was the first place that came to mind. Cheers, friends. :embarrased:
 

Mattie

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Time is the key to many things. I think now is the only time that matters. What you do with your time right now matters. It's a funny thing, when I was younger I would sit on the sidelines, procrastinate, watch movies, play with my son, and go to work. I then decided I wanted to go to College, and than I suppose that got me in better habits and thinking. And eliminated video games, television, and spent my time on projects. I don't think in those earlier days I had a clue about time.

You know what you're taught, and other role models were basically time wasters. And irony of it, is when lazy people preach how you're being lazy. And I think for the longest time I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong. And the AHA Moment. Stop hanging around lazy people who waste time on the wrong things, giving bad advice, and telling you to stop being lazy when they're lazy themselves.

Time is a fascinating thing. You have time to learn, grow, and apply. You have time to execute. You have time to see the results. You have time to adapt and adjust things. Time to see results. Time to learn more. Time to adjust things. There comes a time when you get the results you were looking for, because you learned to use your time in the right fashion.

In all my learning I've understood Business doesn't happen over night, but every day by taking the right actions and using your time wisely.
 

mws87

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Stop hanging around lazy people who waste time on the wrong things, giving bad advice, and telling you to stop being lazy when they're lazy themselves.
^^^ This x10000000. If there was ever some "magic bullet", some "change your life in only one week!" trick, it would be this. It's strange and almost as if we don't consciously realize how deeply our environment (people include) can have an impact on us. A few years back, I went through probably one of the hardest and bizarre points of my life and couldn't figure out how to get ahead. I realized there was no mutual benefit in associating with the people I was used to hanging out with so I cut them out and BAM! - Things began changing in literally no more than 2 weeks. Productivity went up, etc. It was a complete 180 for me and also those around me (more positive attitude, more social, etc). I've hit another wall lately, which reminds me - I should probably get out of California.

In all my learning I've understood Business doesn't happen over night, but every day by taking the right actions and using your time wisely.
I'm a victim of my own doing with this. Although I don't consider what I'm doing (self-pub) a full-fledged business yet, I still get impatient with things and have to smack myself from time to time in order to chill out. It's refreshing to see the view of others and, sometimes, it makes the biggest difference in the world. Thanks for the words @Mattie
 
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Bellini

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Yeah, just the typical of outcome of neglecting fitness for a long time and trying to pick up where I left off :banghead:

Debilitating pain....I have a feeling that's what I will have after I try to snow ski for the first time.
 
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