Leveling Up
Level 1 = money is the ultimate asset
After all, It’s tradeable for almost anything else. You can trade it for comfort, convenience, luxury… think private jets and private box seats at exclusive events, the best clothes and toys and hotels, and, if you have enough, even your own private island. Most of all, it can buy freedom. Freedom from working, freedom from spending your time any way you don’t want to.
It can even “buy” time, in a limited way. You can pay someone to do your laundry so you don’t have to waste your time doing it. It frees your time from unwanted obligations. But there’s a limit. Money can’t actually create more time.
Would you trade lives, right now, with Warren Buffett? He’s 94 years old. Probably not right? Because you’re unwilling to trade your (relatively abundant) time for whatever experience and luxury his money can afford. We can’t make more time, so it’s not worth it, perhaps it even scares us, to think of trading 30, 60, however many years of our life for frailty, for the knowledge deep down we could go at any moment. Even if we had near unlimited money to do whatever we wanted—if the possibilities are so significantly constricted by time, we’re not interested.
So, Level 2 = Time is the ultimate asset.
Time is a finite resource that is not fungible. We all get 5,200 weeks or so, if we’re very lucky. Prioritizing how we spend our time makes much more sense than exclusively pursuing money. Because where’s the break even point of the two curves? Is it worth it to spend 50 years of your life to achieve “fuck you money?” No? 30 years of your life? There’s also the health factor: if you traded 30 years of your life to become a billionaire, and (to be generous) started when you were 18, then you’d be 48 when you have enough money to do whatever you wanted. That doesn’t sound too bad right? But that means you give up travel in your 20’s, 30’s, and most of your 40’s. It means you didn’t get to spend your time with your partner or children. Is a billion dollars worth missing your children growing up? I think most people would not make these trades.
Level 3 = Attention is the ultimate asset
We are what we pay attention to. We can't actually experience everything in life even within our allotted time. When walking down the street, our brain automatically filters out sensations so we can focus on the most important thing in that moment—crossing the street, or listening to that song, or thinking through what that person said to us yesterday.
Within the full scope of our time on Earth, there's a subset that we can actually experience, focus on, and make meaningful. Thus attention becomes our most important asset. We possess the ability to determine our experience with the time we have. Through personal agency, we can literally craft the life we want. What should you focus on? How much time do you spend being angry? Bored? Working? What will you wish you spent your attention and time on at the end of your 5,200 weeks? Only you can answer that. And you vote with your attention.