People’s willingness to pay a price defines market price, and that line is always being tested.

This is probably more of an obvious one, but the social implications are severe, in my opinion.  There are two evils at play here.  The first, a common negotiation strategy is to ask for twice of what you really want.  If I say I want $10 for this shirt, but I only need $5 to make a profit, the buyer can put in work to cut the original $10 price tag in half, feel like they’ve got a huge deal, and as the seller, I’m still happy.  Sellers will always push the boundary of what a consumer will pay, and as long as people keep dishing out the cash, prices will continue to grow with greed.  Think of the auction houses or even antique road show.  They just come out and say, this is worth $10,000 at auction, but they’re really just setting the standard for something that may not even exist.  As long as someone is willing to pay that, it will sell.

The other problem is more of a social norm issue.  The longer prices go unquestioned, the less of an issue it is perceived to be.  We all don’t like paying $5 a gallon for gas, but what can we do to stop it?  There’s enough political power in play that companies like Exxon are posting their largest profits ever, but the price at the pump continues to grow.  Investors are making a killing in the stock market because people keep seeing other people make huge amounts of money driving up the cost of oil.  Gas might be too big of a topic to be a good example, but even with the other side of of consumerism there are examples.  Everyone is fine paying $1.40 for a burger, until McDonald’s comes up with a dollar menu.  Now all the fast food joints are making dollar menus to stay competitive, because people are slowly seeing they can get something cheaper than what they’ve been paying.

There is a big difference between cost and worth and they should never be confused.

Just because a shirt costs $990 does not mean it is worth $990, or anything near that!  There are so many examples of materialism where people pay so much more than the practical value of an item.  Even if you ignore the extreme situations and markups, look at how much time people spend shopping around for ANYTHING.  The fact that a bottle of medicine at costco is 70x cheaper than the same drug elsewhere, or a HDMI cable is $60 at Best Buy but $4 on amazon is ridiculous.

How much debt do you have?  Include everything – school loans, house mortgage, car payment, business borrowing, everything.

Never fully trust a realtor.

Despite what they say, they’re probably not thinking with your desires 100% in their minds.  As a general rule of thumb, you should always know and question people’s intentions.  if they have no incentive to help you, they probably aren’t.  realtors make money from you.  They have a little motivation to make sure you have a good experience for you to throw referrals their way, but all in all, they’re not on the hook for anything.  They know you are going to buy a house.  If they’re selling a house, they know it will sell eventually if it’s reasonable.  The fact is, the more money the save you on the house, the less money they get, so their not going to work as hard as you’d like.

Offer people money when they’re paying for your enjoyment.  My favorite line that lead to this rule came from the Heinritz family:  “Boats don’t run on thanks, they run on gas.”  If they refuse, that’s up to them, but it’s up to you to initiate the gratitude.

Today didn’t go quite how I wanted it to go.  I lost structure and got distracted and demotivated a lot.  We’ll see if I can get better for tomorrow.

7:30 am – Wake up for an 8:00am workday start from home

Noon – quick jaunt to the local post office to send off some last minute gifts, a netflix movie, and a textbook I sold online.  Also stop at the Family Dollar for some milk.

5:00 pm – Return a bathing suit for Kallie to target, then I took a trip over to best buy to pick up new computer speakers.  I was given a $50 gift card to best buy for my birthday, so I was going to pick up something there since my current speakers have a terrible and an unresolvable buzz coming from them.  When I started to browse, I noticed how ridiculously high the prices were.  I pulled up the amazon app on my phone and pretty much every speaker option was $20-$30 higher at best buy.  I was also interested in picking up a nice wireless N router, but those are way too expensive, and still about $20-$30 more than amazon’s prices.  I left without getting anything.

While in transit, I texted 2 separate friends to see if they were interested in grabbing a pint of beer at rock bottom, which used to be a weekly wednesday tradition with some friends.  Both could not go.  I tried not to let it get me too down, but my sails lost some wind.

7:00pm – Come home, move computer desk down stairs to the new lair in the basement.  I grabbed something to eat too, and started to watch “Who’s still standing?”, which is really stupid.  Once I had my fill of stupid, I came back downstairs to keep working at arranging my new set up.

9:00pm – My idea was to organize stuff downstairs for bit after eating, and then go for a run at 9.  Kallie called me pretty much at 9, which was just enough reason for me to lose focus on running.  I have to be up around 4:45am in the morning to make breakfast for the labor halls with the Living Ministry, so I should just call it a night, and hope to rest enough to be motivated to catch up tomorrow.  bed by 10.

The only way to get ahead in life is to own your own business.

Splitting the check evenly should only be attempted for socially close indivuals in numbers 4 or less.   It’s just a mess otherwise.  Someone is going to short change the group.  Someone is going to order more food than everyone else.  You’re going to come up short and 1 person is going to end up paying more than everyone else.  Just don’t do it.  Tell the host you need separate checks before you order.

The bracelet labeled “Corporate Whore”,

I’ve worn since I got my foot in the door,

They bent me over the desk, and I begged to work more,

So that I can pay for things I can’t afford.

The watch that ticks the time,

Reminds me of times I watched slip by,

Every opportunity missed, and chance denied,

And the limited future, until the day I die.

The girlfriend’s hair thing I wear,

A display of affection for the one I care,

A trinket of hope in times of despair,

The band-aid covering my heart’s bleeding tear.

Slave to these charms,

Owned by their meaning,

No one will be keying,

These shackled arms.

What motivates you at work?  Are you never happy unless you get more money?  Do you just want to have freedom to set your own workload and deadlines?  Or is it the opposite in that the more your accomplish tasks, the more you’re happy to work?