Most people die at 25. We just bury them at 75

Posted by Gavin Chau

I’m pretty sure most people won’t read this blog. But here goes! I’m writing from my six-year-old son’s table today. My wife sold all our dining chairs and commandeered the home office table. I’m surrounded by at least 1000 LEGO cars, but it’s a pretty good space to work from. I can look out past our messy backyard to the reserve behind the house, and it reminds me of how lucky we are to be living in Australia.

I keep thinking about this quote.

“Most men die at 25. We just bury them at 75.”

There are measurable milestones each year between birth and the age of 25. First breath, first steps, first teeth, first day at school, puberty, first kiss, HSC, then TAFE or Uni, then you put on your big boy pants and go to work…. That’s it.

Without milestones, all the days blur together like a book without chapters. Then, one day, you wake up and look at yourself in the mirror. You don’t recognize the 65-year-old grey-haired person staring back at you and wonder where your life went.

Once people are at work, the endless grind of most jobs removes people’s ability to think and plan. The choice of safety over risk kills all the dreams people hold. They’re metaphorically dead and just existing. The most exciting thing in their lives is if their sports team wins on the weekend.

So, what does all this have to do with investing? I’ll get there…

We often forget that time is our most precious resource. It is finite and cannot be replenished. The only real way to regain control of your time is to make enough money to wind back your hours or stop working. When you think about it, your money is just a battery of your accumulated work. You can draw on it to work less and regain control of the time you’ve been allotted. There’s some truth to the old saying that ‘time is money’ beyond simply the pay you get per hour.

It’s nearly impossible to save enough money to retire, no matter how frugally you live and how well-paying your job is. The central banks will always see that your money loses purchasing power faster than most people can get pay rises. Investing in something that beats the rate of monetary debasement* is the only way out. The good news is people are only one decision away from taking control of their time, so they can rejoin the undead and provide a better future for their kids.

*monetary debasement is the continued erosion of the purchasing power of money. It happens as central banks increase the money supply (which they can create out of thin air). The more money in the system, the less scarce each dollar becomes. We see the effect as continuously rising prices (fuel, gold, land, groceries etc)

Posted by Gavin Chau, on 1st Oct 2024