Wealth is not his that has it, but his that enjoys it.”
- Benjamin Franklin
- Benjamin Franklin
A group of professional 20-somethings visited their favorite professor from university at his home. They complained about the stresses of young professional life and how hard it was to adjust to the rat race. The professor listened quietly and then asked them if they would like some coffee. They said yes.
He made some coffee and got out cups for everyone. Half of the cups were plain and plastic. The other half were his nicest and most expensive porcelain cups. He then invited the young adults up to pour themselves coffee.
The former students vied for the nice porcelain cups, negotiating, complaining, comparing and evaluating over who got what. Even after they sat down and began drinking the coffee, they were still eyeing each others cups and making jokes or comments about who got the nice ones and who didn’t.
The professor smiled and said, “You see? This is your problem. You are all arguing over who got to drink out of the nice cups, when all you really wanted was the coffee.”
The Definition of Wealth
I don’t own any property. I don’t own a suit, or a watch, or cologne. I don’t own a car. I haven’t owned a television in over 10 years and don’t want one. I have a small suitcase of clothes and a laptop. I consider myself to be an extremely wealthy individual.
That wealth comes from my experience; and the efficiency in which I’ve organized my life to achieve greater experiences.
I believe I come from a unique background when it comes to wealth. I grew up in a family with a lot of money. We had a massive house, swimming pool, expensive cars, expensive vacations. By the time I was eight my brother and I each had our own televisions and video game systems. By the time I was 10, we had our own computers. We each had two bedrooms and our own bathrooms. I attended expensive private schools and was given a car on my sixteenth birthday.
But for most of my childhood and adolescence, my family was miserable. My parents divorced, and my brother and I each went through our own episodes of trouble with the law.
I realize a lot of people grow up with more serious problems. And I don’t want to come across as the spoiled rich kid whining about how “Yeah, dad bought me a car, but he didn’t hug me enough.” Trust me, we have better things to talk about.
The point is I had the opportunity to witness first-hand for the first 20 years of my life that having a lot of money did not necessarily make people happy, and in some cases, it even wedges people apart and tortures them in subtle and silent ways.
Psychological studies on happiness in the past couple decades have supported this. Research shows that money correlates with happiness up until a middle-class income and after that, there’s no correlation between money and happiness. Happiness flatlines.
One recent study even suggests that making more money can decrease how much we enjoy normal, everyday activities, and inspire us to disconnect from those around us. Both of these factors can lead to greater unhappiness.
Now I don’t mean to get preachy. I realize this is a guide to wealth, not some lecture on the vices of greed. I’m not here to lecture you or moralize all day. Making money is great, I wholly endorse it. I love making money.
But it’s important to think about what the point of earning money is. Ideally, we want to make money so we can enjoy the “finer things” in life. What I’m questioning is what those “finer things” in life actually are.
What’s the point in having a gigantic house and a nice car if you’re never home to enjoy them? What’s the point of having a gigantic plasma TV if you have no one to watch it with? Why make $150,000 a year and hate your job, if you could make $75,000 a year and love your job?
Money buys happiness only when it is spent on experiences and earned without costing too much time. This is why I find it less useful to define wealth in terms of money, and define it instead in terms of the quality of life experiences.
Money is a requisite for wealth, but so is time and so is efficient use of that time and money. Money gives one opportunities for more experiences. But one must also have the time to pursue those experiences. Having the money to travel to Australia isn’t worth anything if you can’t ever take time off work to go there.
By this definition, a lawyer who works 110-hour weeks and never sees his kids is not rich. But a surf instructor who lives with his Costa Rican wife on the beaches of Ecuador is. Call me a tree-hugging hippy, but I’m interested in overall quality of life experience, not how big the number is that shows up in my bank account. As I’ll explain later, money is something that I try to get rid of, as soon as possible.
I’ve been to 41 countries and dated amazing women from all over the world. I speak four languages, often party on weeknights and wake up whenever I want. I’ve sipped cocktails in the most exclusive casinos of London with Saudi royalty, danced with international models in Singapore, had beers with porn stars in LA and coffee with Pablo Escobar’s brother in Colombia.
And I did all of this for less per year than the cost of a middle-class lifestyle back in the United States.
Money is only as valuable as the experiences it brings you. Experiences create happiness. Money is merely a tool used to achieve greater experience.
To become wealthy requires one to effectively invest their time and money into the most fulfilling experiences possible. This begs the question, which experiences bring the most happiness? Surely watching a Family Guy marathon on television while stuffing your face with Cheetos isn’t as fulfilling of an experience as say, attending a friend’s wedding, or scaling the mountains of Yosemite Park.
Money is meant to be spent.
Money is meant to be spent. You earn money by adding value and experiences to the lives of others and it’s spent to create value and experience in your own. In a way, you can view money as a transference of experience. Through your work you contribute to an enhanced experience in other people’s lives and in turn the money you receive is then spent on enhancing the experience in yours.
Investing money can be useful if one plans on using it for experiences later (i.e., retirement, emergency savings, etc.) or on experiences which will open up more opportunities for greater experiences (education, business investment, training). Investments are only as useful as the future experiences they are likely to bring. So stockpiling more and more money in the bank is counter-productive to building wealth!
Eventually all money is spent on some form of experience, even if that experience is indirect, such as paying taxes or buying insurance (arguably the two least enjoyable ways to spend money). The important question is, if our money buys experience, then which experiences have the highest return on investment in terms of life happiness and fulfillment?
Obviously, this is a really subjective question as everyone has different passions, needs and interests. If you suffer from chronic back pain, then spending thousands of dollars on a fancy orthopedic office chair may be the best purchase of the year for you; yet for me it would be a total waste.
Your fundamental needs take precedence: health, food, shelter. If these three needs are not met, then nothing else is going to make you happy and not having them is going to make you miserable. But assuming you have those needs met, then research indicates that the experiences which create the most happiness are:
- New and unique activities.
- Shared experiences with others and building relationships.
- Passion activities.
So that membership at the rock climbing gym with your friend Jimmy is going to be more enriching and meaningful than the new Lost DVD set. Inviting your neighbors to a fourth of July barbecue in your backyard will be more enriching than watching the parade on television. Saving up for a trip to the beach will be more worthwhile than buying a new couch or upgrading your computer to play the new Everquest game.
I find it most helpful to view all expenditures through the lens of the experiences they bring. A new car brings a certain amount of experiences for the cost. A plane ticket does the same. A new paint job in your living room does the same. A street hot dog when you’re drunk does the same thing (in this case, the experience involves the toilet the next morning).
The problem is many expenditures have “hidden” experiences which we don’t consider. For instance, when you buy a new car, you think about how it will feel to drive to work, what your friends will think of it, the new sound system, picking up a date in it. What you don’t think about is the maintenance required on it, getting stuck in traffic, paying too much for parking, the stress of finding your door dinged one afternoon, the stress of finding parking tickets in your dash, digging it out of snow, the stress of raising gas prices, etc.
What’s also absent is the opportunity costs of that new car. Those car payments each month could go toward new hobbies, new experiences with friends, weekend trips to the beach, or a new guitar (passion activity). What if you could take the bus or metro each morning, avoid traffic, and have enough money to see an extra concert each month and take a vacation to Europe instead of the usual road trip you take to Miami (or wherever)?
I can’t tell you what’s better or worse. We all have our own preferences and values. These are just things to think about. I haven’t owned a car in nine years. The costs of maintaining it far outweigh the value of having it for me, especially when I prefer living in big cities with good public transportation and taxis. Why spend $15,000 on a car, when I can spend an extra $500 a month and live in the best part of town and walk everywhere? Not only am I avoiding the hassles of parking, tolls, gas, tickets, but I’m ALSO saving money, AND I’m in better shape (and helping the environment, which I care about).
I realize a lot of people live in cities that require having a car, but even then, why drive an expensive one? What’s the value-add? Looking cool? A few compliments? Is that really worth the extra $10,000?
Maybe there’s some futon or kitchenette set you feel you MUST have. What experience does it add? What hidden experiences are involved in maintaining them, cleaning them, moving them?
Now imagine that money going towards trip to Aruba with your girlfriend. Or a Vegas trip with your two best guy friends. Or a surprise skydiving trip with your brother for his birthday. Those are experiences you’ll remember and value for a lifetime and will expand your perspective and identity. Sure, there are hidden experiences involved (security line at the airport, arguing with the hotel attendant, getting shoved out of a plane by some asshole), but these are negative experiences that you can share with others. Shit happens. No matter what you do. But the difference between the run-in with the cops in Vegas and some guy backing into your new car at work is that one makes for a great story a year later, the other makes for great stomach ulcers.
And this doesn’t even get into spending money on experiences for OTHER people.
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