Status Updates From Your Money or Your Life

Nothing is certain. Nothing. That’s life. If you don’t like it, you’re out of luck.

Treasury bonds, when they are newly issued, can be bought directly from the Federal Reserve, with no commissions whatsoever, through a program called TreasuryDirect. This cuts out the middleman: no broker, no added brokerage house fees. You can also buy existing Treasury bonds through a broker (for a minimal fee).

On Treasury Bonds:

The national debt is the most senior obligation the government has; principal and interest on Treasury securities must be paid when they come due, before paying for anything else. Not to do so would destroy the “credit rating” of the US government in world markets.

To put it simply, SRI [Socially Responsible Investing] seeks to:
- Avoid negative impacts
- Seek positive impacts
- Influence the policies of the companies you’ve invested in

The standard types of assets are: stocks, fixed income (bonds), real estate, commodities (minerals, fossil fuels, crops), and foreign currencies. Often when one asset class is going up, another is going down, so diversifying across asset classes is one way people manage risk.

After the Crossover Point, you want to maximize passive income while minimizing risk so you can pay the least attention possible to your money.

If you got here before reading the rest of the book, expecting some hot new investment scheme, please go back to page 1. This chapter is for those of you who’ve accumulated sufficient money—through jobs, running your own business, inheritance, or even successful investing—that you are able and eager to free up your time for what matters more than making more money.

Choice is the true heart of Financial Independence. It’s not about the money. It’s about the choice of where you direct your most precious resources: your time, your attention and your life.

Breaking the link between work and money in actual fact will exponentially expand the possibility of discovering your true work, of reintegrating the disparate pieces of your life, and of being truly whole.

Your Financial Independence is simply one corner of your foundation of security and freedom. Financial Interdependence includes all four corners: abilities, belonging, and community, along with your hard-won stuff; these constitute your total nest egg. Together, your national wealth and natural wealth will make you rich beyond measure.

What about the s in those ABCs of wealth? That’s your “stuff,” your financial and material wealth. Notice it’s not capitalized—that’s because it’s only a small consideration in the caring economy.

Joe Dominguez was fond of saying, “Consciousness grows faster than inflation.” In other words, you can “inflate” your skills, competencies, knowledge, close companions, and community connections faster than money.

It’s the totality of the social and natural systems that will hold you safe, nourish your soul, inspire your service, and provide you with what you need over the long haul.

Isolation is expensive; sharing is wealth—sometimes literally, through services that will rent your car, home, or RV to others, but also more deeply, as in the myriad of daily exchanges that have nothing to do with financial transactions.

The more trusting the community, the more resources are shared freely.

Widen the circle of relatedness and you are in the third pillar of natural wealth: community. Community is a natural human currency. It is currency because it facilitates trade within communities that share and care outside the money economy.

This is sometimes referred to as “social capital”—that is, the wealth you create through your networks of mutually beneficial relationships.

It’s no accident that most spiritual paths—including Alcoholics Anonymous and other recovery programs—suggest an honest look at your relationships: whom you’ve harmed, whom you still resent, whom you need to make peace with. Loneliness is epidemic—and expensive.

Not only does this caring economy make life less expensive, it makes life richer in precisely what life is truly for: giving and receiving.

Our human bonds of love and loyalty have always gotten us through the night—and life.

Lifelong learning is a key to happiness. Invest in your ability to survive and thrive and help others and you will never be bored. It will keep paying off in an alert mind and a secure place in society, long after your years of paid employment come to an end.

Having diverse skills and abilities is one key to resilience—the capacity to thrive no matter what happens in the financial markets. Honing your skills gives you leverage, freedom, and choice. This diversity of abilities is one form of wealth that you can build over a lifetime to challenge yourself, to do for others, to be of use in your community, to make money if needed, and to meet life with courage.

Sometimes it makes more sense to invest in yourself by attending a training or getting certified in such skills rather than investing in a financial instrument.

As you take your eyes off the false prize (of more, better, and different stuff), you put them on the real prizes: friends, family, sharing, caring, learning, meeting challenges, intimacy, rest, and being present, connected, and respected. In other words, those best things in life that are free.

Abilities, Belonging, and Community are the three forms of natural wealth you build intuitively in the process of aligning how you earn, spend, and save money with your purpose and fulfillment.

ABCs OF NATURAL WEALTH

Abilities includes your skills and knowledge—what you know how to do.

Belonging is who walks with you in life.

Community is the society you live in (in real life and even online)—your neighbors, your city, your environment—and nature.

The more we weave our lives beneficially with others, the less money we need to have access to everything we could possibly want.

Capital. Cushion. Cache. The three pillars of Financial Independence.

In your FI program, your cache is a store of extra money (beyond your capital or your cushion) that builds up for future use.

Even if your freedom leads you to another career, another irresistible business idea, or another lifestyle choice that costs more money and you return to paid employment, your first finite period of time changes you forever. You know you can do it again. You’re savvy and empowered, resilient and knowledgeable.