Conservation Laws
by blogrdocI’ve discussed topics of variation, correlation and now - perhaps my favorite topic since it is so simple and powerful: conservation.
Food is just one of the things that we consume for which we have to watch our diet. Here’s a list of other critical consumables which we can also have “junk food” equivalents:
1. Time
2. Relationships
3. Your personal energy
4. Money
Theory
Time and relationships cannot be replaced nor accumulated. The irreplaceableness of time is self-evident. As for relationships, yes you can have more than one child, and I suppose, in certain cultures, more than one spouse. But - if you believe, as I do, that every person is unique and infinitely valuable, I do not consider people “interchangeable”.
I list item #3 as ‘your personal energy’ to distinguish it from, say - the energy generated from a power plant or the sun.
My point here is that if we keep in mind that these critical consumables are in fact… consumable - we should place ourselves on a ‘diet’ of these things just as we would food.
‘Parkinson’s Law’ as Tim Ferriss has drawn attention to recently (also known as the ‘80/20′ law), in my view, is simply a re-expression of placing yourself on a time/energy diet. Many personal finance blogs are a re-expression of placing yourself on a financial diet. Seek out the ‘vegetable’ equivalents in these critical consumables. They may be unpleasant, but they will reap returns. One of the mantra’s of this blog is to ‘run lean’ and by that, I don’t just mean the ‘traditional’ diet.
Topics for discussion:
1. What are some time-veggies you can think of?
Ans: Planning. Daily reflection.
2. What are some money-veggies you can think of?
Ans: Dollar-cost averaging. Extra credit answer: Value averaging (i’ve heard of this and heard that it is *better* than Dollar cost averaging, but I have no idea what it is)
3. What are some relationship-veggies you can think of?
Ans: Making the first move on calling a friend you haven’t talked to in a while. Unconditional love, etc…
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4 Responses to “Conservation Laws”
By Sam Crockett on Mar 25, 2008 | Reply
I used to waste a lot of time through “junk food” activities, i.e., mindless tv watching, and countless hours playing video games (never play World of Warcraft as it would be the cocaine of time junk food).
In the last few years I’ve heavily cut back on these time sinks. I’ll still play the occasional video game, and follow a select few tv shows (Doctor Who and Battlestar Galactica), but I spend more of time on hobbies (computers and web development) and I try to read at least a book a week on a wide variety of topics. My time-veggies are web development, daily journalling, reading, and running.
As for money-veggies I try to buy raw ingredients to cook my meals from scratch. Doing this saves me money (in the long run), is healthier (less processed foods), and teaches me an important life skill that many in my generation delegate to the fast food restaurant.
I can’t think of any relationship veggies as that is an area of my life that could use improvement.
By blogrdoc on Mar 25, 2008 | Reply
I had to eat a lot of relationship veggies when I first met my wife. They tasted awful, but they were worth it. :)
Right now… I’m stuggling to determine if this blog junk food or veggie!