There is a scene in the movie "Finding Nemo" where the fish have escape the aquarium, have somehow navigated their way across all other obstacles between the dentist's office and into the water of the harbor.
There they are, with great planning and physical prowess, they have made their goal. There is only one problem, they are each in plastic bags, floating in the harbor. One of the fish says "Now what?"
The goal of this blog was to capture some of my thoughts as I reached this milestone. Now what?
Someone once asked Seth Godin "How much do you think you should charge for your blog?" He restated the question by saying, "How much would I be willing to pay in order to write my blog?" I take his point. The journey of writing this blog has been an exceptional benefit to me. To my knowledge, maybe one or two people glance at this site every few days, but for me to challenge myself to write something that others may read and may use in their lives has forced me to up my game.
Now I end this blog and I thank every one of you who has looked at it.
I'm now 50. I reached my goal and I hope some of my words on this blog has helped you in your journey of life somehow.
Tomorrow I start a new blog. "How I intend to make $3 million and give it all away."
In my 50 years and in my travels around the globe, I've been amazed at what people would do for money. Tragic really, things that really tugged at my soul, things I reeled from in horror. Yes, there was the ever present prostitution in Juarez, Mexico, Seoul, Korea, Bangkok, Thailand, but there was also this old man in Beijing China I saw 1989 who would take a metal rod, heat it up with a blowtorch and then stick the red hot metal to his tongue. He walked around the audience doing this so that we could see the steam and hear the sizzling noise of the damage to his body. There was also this young girl who danced on broken glass, perhaps these were demonstrations of self-control, a Zen type way of defeating a physical threat, or some kind of theatric trick, but to me, these were examples of the many destructive things people do for money....I'm so sorry I was part of that audience, I am so sorry people feel it necessary to do such things with their lives.
Perhaps people need to do these things in-order to survive another day. If so, I'd like to find and prove there is another way....
Money should not be something that we end up destroying ourselves for in order to get more of. It should only be a tool to help us get to where we need to go - and that's it. It should not be hoarded and it should not be lusted after.
Almost everyday my mail box is stuffed with requests from charities asking for money. The inbox in my hotmail account is almost useless now because of scams, charities and businesses trying to get me to send money to them.
Pretty selfish really and because so many people are doing this, somehow this makes such behavior acceptable - even the norm.
I'm going to go the other way. I'm not going to break myself, my family or anything else in the pursuit of the dollar bill. I've had a goal for sometime now to make / acquire $3 Million in a legal, honest way and then (here's the kicker) give it all away. Yes, all of it. Done. Good-bye, back to my real life.....You guys have a nice day.
No, I'm not going to give it to you. There are specific charities and organizations that will receive it.
The challenge of the process is can I make / aquire / hang onto this money in a legal, kind, honest way AND then can I give it all away once I reach the first half of the goal?
How much money is enough? People always want more. Can I resist this? Can I give instead of take?
This blog will up my game and I plan on writing it each day until I reach the goal or until Nov 23, 2016.
Wish me luck!
Don't send money. Send me you good thoughts if you can. Send me ideas that can help me get there. I know I can't make this goal alone, but I'm going to start alone and I'm going to start trying alone, right now.
The journey and joy of making this money (and giving it all away) will not incorporate a process of taking it away from someone or something else. The process (in part) will be to create something of value, worth such a sum. You can find it here: My next blog.
Live well!
-Chris
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