Here are a few things our parents told us in the 90’s that we must re-evaluate. For the first 4 things our parents told us in the 90s, check out Part 1.
5. If you’re sick, go to the doctor
When I was growing up, the doctor was the professional. They were where you went when you got sick, and if anything happened, you would immediately schedule a visit so you could get better.
This idea we definitely need to re-evaluate.
In order to go to a doctor, you must have health insurance. How much is health insurance? A few hundred dollars per month? We have to spend a few hundred dollars per month so we can spend more money to get a face to face visit with them?
Once you get to the doctor, what are they going to tell you? Unless you have a trusted doctor who knows you inside and out, and who really cares about you, that doctor is hoping to prescribe you some medicine so you can get out of their office. They have other patients, and they’re busy.
When that doctor prescribes you medicine, they get paid. Some doctors even have deals with certain drug companies to prescribe you the most expensive medicine. When they prescribe it, what do you say to that? No? All they have to do is give you a slight touch of fear with your symptoms, and you will buy anything they put in front of you.
Most of the time, the medicine they give you just masks your symptoms. In the short term, it helps by not having those symptoms, yet it doesn’t fix the real problem, whatever that may be. What you need to do is fix the real problem at the root, not getting medicine to cover up the symptoms of your problem.
Take care of yourself so you don’t have to ingest these side-effect laden medicines. Eat well, exercise, and pay attention to your mind and body. Your body will thank you, along with your bank account.
6. Save your money
We were introduced to savings accounts when we were younger. You gave your money to the bank, and you would get free money each month.
As I got older though, I realized how much we were being ripped off. A typical savings interest rate is less than 1%. Inflation is normally 3%. In the long run, by saving your money, you will be losing your money. Without having good investments to grow what you currently have, your wealth will decrease year by year as time goes on.
Not much to really say on this, except to do research before you invest your money, invest in a diversified portfolio, and hope that there’s not another market collapse.
7. Work hard
“Work hard”. It’s the rule that can’t ever be broken, right? It’s the one definite rule that will always provide you success, and something that everybody agrees on, right?
Wrong. Hard work is for suckers. Smart work is for the wealthy.
Everybody works hard. Somebody can work hard their entire life, and still not have anything to show for it after 50 years. But they will be respected by their colleagues and peers because they “Were a hard worker”. It’s like saying somebody, “Has a great personality.”
Smart vs. hard work separates the average from the excellent, the mediocre from the high achievers, and the 1% from everybody else.
Instead of just blindly working hard, stop once in a while and ask yourself, “Why am I working?” Is there a higher position you want to get to? Is there a promotion you are looking for? Is this just a stepping stone to a bigger thing in the future? If you don’t have any goals for yourself, you’re just spinning your wheels.
A cliché term is that the wealthy has their money work for them, while the non-wealthy work for their money. The wealthy are smart workers who constantly have an end-goal in mind, and create processes that help them build upon their wealth. The non-wealthy work hard, but aren’t nearly as rewarded for it as the smart workers.
Being “busy” is overrated. Having a future goal for your busyness is smart work.
8. Retire
They told us to work hard, so we could retire. What is retirement, though? Sitting in an air conditioned house all day, watching TV? Or having the highlight of the week going to the local supermarket?
Retirement sounds depressing to me. It seems like a bunch of wasted life. If you’re retired from the corporate world, and still have an active lifestyle, that’s one thing. But I think our parents wanted us to just sit around, comfortably and peacefully, and wait until the grim reaper appeared from the shadows to take us to the afterlife.
In today’s world, retirement is nearly extinct. Not only will pensions and social security cease to exist in the future, but most people don’t want to stop working. With the lack of barriers to entry in most businesses now, the rise of older entrepreneurs will increase.
An illuminating story I read recently was about an older guy who worked at the same job for about 40 years, not missing a day of work. On the day of his retirement, there was a celebration, with newspapers covering the event. Everybody was so proud of him for not missing one day of work.
Two weeks later, the newspaper did an update on him. They regretted to inform us that he had passed away. You know why he passed away? Because he didn’t have a purpose for his life anymore. He lived to work, be around his colleagues, and provide a high-quality service for his customers.
It’s the same thing that happened to Joe Paterno. When he was fired by Penn State after a scandal, he didn’t have any more reason to live. He wasn’t going to dust off his resume and start applying for positions on CareerBuilder. Penn State was his entire life, and when they took that away, he was ready to go.
Retirement, along with many other things our parents told us, are fading away. Some of these ideas are still relevant and some will be relevant forever, but in an ever-changing world, we must adapt to the new way that things are done.
We are living in a new economy and a new world, where people get fired for status updates and an internet search engine is one of the world’s biggest companies. The moment we open our eyes to this, we will begin to thrive.
Tyson Hartnett has played professional basketball in Sweden, Argentina, and Chile, and has recently started his first business, BasketballTrainingClub.com. He created Basketball Training Club to try to help players from all over the world not only better their basketball games, but to try to help better their lives as well.
Image Credit: www.tfw2005.com
