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Don’t forget the money !
Let’s say you are young and destiny has shuffled some really questionable cards for you: deadbeat/abusive dad, alcoholic mother, money problems, 3rd world country ( those were some of mine ) or maybe later in life you feel lost ( also me at times), alluring life advice and self improvement gurus are everywhere these days and at some point you will hear some variation of the following which seems to magically solve all your problems :
Just do what you love, money, happiness and fulfillment will follow !
I believe this advice is at best questionable, outdated , impractical and at worst will ruin the life of those most in need of good advice which this is definitely not.
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The most eloquent and original form perhaps comes from philosopher Alan Watts in a talk/seminar that usually goes by “What Would You Like To Do If Money Were No Object?” Here are the two relevant bits :
“Forget the money, because if you say that getting the money is the most important thing, you will spend your life completely wasting your time. You’ll be doing things you don’t like doing in order to go on living”“if you do really like what you are doing, it doesn’t matter (what) it is, you can eventually become a master on it. The only way of becoming a master of something is if you are really with it, and then you’ll be able to get a good fee for whatever it is.”
For some reason Alan Watts is a great source of spoken samples for Electronic Music, you can find bits of his speeches all over the place like this one: Forget the money by Nick Bateman, but I digress…
What year is it !?
By my best estimate Alan Watts formed these views around the 1940’s and 50’s (or earlier) when the average house price (inflation…
