The Intersection of Wants and Assets; The Secret Sauce!

There are a lot of smart people with good advice.  Guys like Tim Ferriss, Robert Kiyosaki, and Rick Smith (to name only a very few) will inspire you to get up off your ass and take action.  I like it, I too like to think of myself as  a man of action. The ideas of mini retirements, owning your own business, having a portfolio of high yield investments, and outsourcing your life are all great, but how does it apply to you, further, why should it apply to you?    Once you have decided to make a change and to take action there is NO END to the possibilities.  The Internet makes information on almost anything available, a lot free and a lot for sale.  Ok, that is great, but more (and I think very valid) questions. . . .

Where do I go now?   How do I know what is good for me?  Is this something I should pay attention to? Etc. . .

My point is that the shear volume of “messages” transmitted is enormous and after you have decoded and understand them you need a frame of reference in order to determine where time and energy will be spent.

Let’s review a very  basic Shannon-Weaver communication model with my own scribbles.

There are lots of messages coming at you from many different transmitters (sticking the basic terminology in the model).  You receive and decode the message and for the purpose of this discussion understand the message.  The challenge then becomes creating the framework in which you can determine if this something to focus on.  Focusing on it means you will spend time, energy and other resources on it.  This framework is the secret sauce, you’ve found it!

Well, almost.

Remember we’ve already discussed the starting point of designing your lifestyle.  That starting point includes figuring out what you want and taking stock of your assets.   Take that list of wants you created and put it next to the list of assets.  Do any intersections jump out at you?  One of the asset classes Jake mentioned was knowledge.  Let’s say you are very good using basic productivity software on the computer and in your fee time lately you have helped some friends create some very attention-grabbing resumes.  Now, let’s say one of your wants is to have your own business.  Its not a very big  jump to see the intersection here.  Can you have a business creating resumes for people, sure you can.  The resume business is not the point though.  The point is the intersection of the want and the asset.

Not all intersections will jump out at you immediately, be creative and be patient.  Repeat the exercise of comparing the lists multiple times and see what you come up with.

Now you’re one step further down the path, maintain your list of intersections and use them as framework deciding which messages you focus on.