As I get older I observe and I observe more.
Writing a blog magnifies and multiplies that (because you need material for your blog)
Writing a blog everyday multiplies it even more.
Most of the problems I see and encounter on a day to day basis seem to centre around some form of greed or another. There are many forms of greed, not just financial, not just material.
Take for example, theological greed. The fact that you must believe what I believe and so must the rest of the world - the greed of wanting to spread your belief to everybody because you are correct. Not satisfied that you believe what you believe but insatiably attempting to pass that belief on to other people, be it religious, philosophical or material
But this blog is not for that. This blog is for financial greed and here's a scenario to get things going...
Imagine I won the lottery this weekend from a ticket that was given to me in a birthday care from one of my friends. They had paid for the lottery ticket and decided to give it to me as a birthday present (a joke) and it inadvertently allowed me to win £10million. What do I do with the friend in that situation?
Do I look back to Friday night when I didn't have £10million when I would have been grateful for £5million and give them half the money because they were at least half involved in the winning? Or do I freeze out the friendship and keep the money because, after all, they gave the ticket to me so the ticket became mine and the money is mine?
You see the point I hope?
You can extrapolate this out to freelance work which effectively you sell to people as wholesale, so you pay me £500 per day (which equates to nearly £100,000 per year if I work normal working days) but from my £500 you make £2,000. That seems like a fair ratio and fair odds. You have costs to pay, distribution of whatever and you're able to make a 20 or 30% profit - that seems reasonable.
What happens when my work becomes so good that you start to earn £8,000 or £10,000 or £15,000 from my £500 per day? Should you pay me more or is it your right just to squeeze as much as you can out of the creativity or artistry or manufacturing genius that I provide which has created something better?
This is where I see the greed the most and this is where things fall down.
Knowing your worth and knowing other people's worth and being fair are some of the most important ways for relationships to work. Underestimating or overestimating your worth can be a true disaster but usually the exploitation for financial reasons is the main cause of relationship breakdown.
I have a conflict at the moment, external to my work, to deal with and I am neutral to this. On looking at both sides (all the way around Edward de Bono's box) both people are just being greedy. They need to step back, remove their greed, file it back into the situation and the conflict will be over but they won't.. they'll dig their heels in and they'll fall out - probably with each other and probably with me all because of greed.
The aftermath of a fall out like this is the loss on ongoing 'productivity' either in a relationship or business arrangement. True short term thinking. Truly disastrous if what you actually seek is a happy content existence.
Blog Post Number: 1091
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