My wife is scared. Me, not so much.
She is worried about us getting in over our heads with a renovation that we can't afford without taking a loan for it and then being unable to complete it. It is a legitimate concern for sure, but one that I am not so worried about, because as I figure it - we'll manage.
How I figure it is even if we can't complete the renovations quickly, we will have a roof overhead and the monthly costs will not be too different than they are now. What we will forgo is comfort and ease of living, as well as the emotional pain of failure. I think that last one is the biggest concern for my wife as if we get the loan, it comes with a level of confidence that the work will get completed. Without it, it becomes a little more uncertain.
The weird thing is that I think I should be scared too, yet seem to be much calmer than I suspected I would under these conditions. I know that I am no more confident of completion, but I do think that I am much better at handling uncertainty than I once was, as well as trusting in my own ability to survive. The reason I trust in my abilities is that I have a pretty good work ethic and while not everything pans out, I feel that I can work my way out of most situations adequately enough.
It does take a toll though and while 40 years of age, I feel both much younger and physically older simultaneously. Last night my wife was saying that we have the option of staying where we are and saving so that we can buy and do the renovations later, but how much later - when I am close to retirement?
The problem with that is we already know that the costs of our housing will increase in that time which makes saving harder, so by the time we can make a move, who knows what age I will be. There are a few couples in their late mid 70s who live in our building who give me the impression that they are still waiting for life to begin - after moving here in the 1970s. when it was built. A starter home that became the only home.
They have a roof over their heads too, but they do not seem happy and I think that I would rather take the risk now and have it fail and end up where they are later, than not take the risk and increase the likelihood by living life as they are now. Of course, you can be happy anywhere and under relatively poor conditions, but being happy after choosing the safe option and living a stagnant life I believe is harder.
It is kind of like that saying, it is better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all. Taking a few risks in life with the potential of wearing a few failures, might not only come with opportunity, but the life experiences associated might be valuable in themselves. Not only that, I do believe there is additional value in taking agency and making own decisions, even if they prove bad later.
And what if they work? Will it seem a stroke of brilliance, wisdom and skill? It will be interesting in five years to look back on this period of posts and see how accurate they are and if I still feel it was the right decision.
I actually think the same about Steem and while at the moment there is a lot of uncertainty, I think that five years from now the picture will be quite clear. Looking back from the future, will you be glad you bought, sad you bought, glad you passed or sad you passed? time will tell, but for me I can say that at least I participated the best I could, which could come with a write-off failure, or very large gains. I will be happy either way, as I know there is very little more I could have done to aim for accomplishing my personal goals.
Playing the best game possible is the only way to really know potential, and I think that in order to fulfill human potential, barriers needed to be crossed and fears need to be met in order to be overcome. If we never face our fears, we have no need to overcome them. And perhaps this is a fear of my own, where I do not want to look back on my life and recognize that I held myself back from trying because I was scared of being the potential for pain, especially if that pain is conceptual in source, like the sense of failure for not having enough money or worry about reputation based on what others may think.
I know that the challenges my family and I face are definitely first world issues and pale in comparison to many others, but we all live the life relative to our own experience, and that means that for us, this is important. To another, perhaps the risk is nothing, perhaps it is far too high.
I have to look at it from my negative mental position as normal and factor in, what is the worst that can happen and when that is considered with reasoning, it is only an economic loss. Yes, that could put a great deal of stress on other areas through knock-ons, but that is the case anyway. If we stay where we are we will slowly be bled dry, if we move we might end up in the same position or not much worse - but there is upside potential to be in a much better position.
I spoke about this in my last post, and in my opinion and while it has to be considered on a case by case basis, investing into low loss but high gain should take precedence over the comfort of the status quo. Again, this is something I believe Steem offers and if my investments here pay off in the next five years even to a mid-level, the concerns of the "housing crisis" I face today will seem silly. But, the learning experience of taking that risk will have value either way.
Risk management is an area I haven't really been good at in the past and barely considered which meant living on defaults. The default option for most of us is to play it safe, even if the risk of loss is low. I have played safe and here I am today - looking for risk.
What's the worst that can happen?
I have a few stories.
Taraz
[ a Steem original ]