What Now????

I have a question: What is the one thing you will end up taking away from this economic crisis we find ourselves in?

There’s a never ending stream of news articles about how we got here, who’s to blame, finger pointing, predictions about the length, depth, and duration of this, the worst recession since the Great Depression. I’ll leave the analysis of those statistics to the professionals and hope they come up with something that makes an ounce of sense. I for one am not holding my breath that they will be successful, though. One statistic I do believe is that history repeats itself. We’ve been here before and we will be here again. I’m young enough to not remember any of the previous major downturns of our economy, so this slump has been an eye opening experience for me. It has raised some important questions in my formerly peacefully complacent mind.

I grew up thinking that EVERYONE went to school and then got a job. End of story. Sure, I knew that there were a few people out there who had started businesses or inherited a fortune or maybe chose to be a stay-at-home mom, but for me I knew that it was “hi-ho, hi-ho, its off to work I go.” Both my parents worked throughout the majority of my life. They didn’t always like their jobs, but they were excellent role models of how to be responsible for your family and keep a steady job.

Many parents were like mine, going to work to bring home their paycheck and live decent lives. But what has happened to these hard working average people? They have been rewarded with layoffs, pay cuts, benefit cuts, and entire businesses going belly up. I know so many people who have found themselves suddenly jobless, no income or assets to their name and no prospect of finding a new job, especially not one that they actually want. Now that we are in this mess, I can’t help but wonder why in the world so many people worked so hard to put all their financial eggs in one basket? Now their baskets are bumped and eggs broken, and some have been completely overturned so that all the holder now has is a gooey mess on the floor.

Well, the fact that so many people were never taught and never thought about any other way is for a completely different post…

What I want to know is: What are you going to do now?

If you are reading this you are probably already in real estate investing, just starting to get into it, or maybe just thinking about this kind of business. If so then good for you! But what else are you working on? Just because you’ve realized that being a normal employee isn’t the way to go doesn’t mean you should just switch all you precious eggs to a new basket!!!! The name of the game now, for those of you who are still wondering, is diversification. We need to all be looking for multiple forms and streams of income. Real estate has incredible opportunities and statistically will always perform over the long term, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have other things working for you to secure your way of life.

I’m working on just that plan myself. In addition to getting into real estate investing a little while back, I have been actively researching other avenues that will enhance my lifestyle and lead to finally becoming truly financially independent. I am very, very close. NOW is the best time we’ll ever have to take a step back, honestly assess our lives, and decide where we want to go from here. The media may be telling us how terrible things are in our economy, but I only see how many opportunities are suddenly available. Didn’t I read somewhere that more millionaires were made out of the Great Depression than any other period of time before or since? That’s exactly what I’m taking away from this whole debacle, that it’s a gift for us all to start again more intelligently and prosperously (see my earlier post on failure!).

Make a plan to split those eggs up and put them in many baskets. Start a business, join a network marketing/direct sales company, go back to school to learn something new, check out stocks and options (the market will go up again, ever hear buy low sell high?), write a book, invent something, DO ANYTHING other than what we were all doing before. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results. Keep your job or look for a new job if you must, who doesn’t want some security in their weekly income? But DO NOT under ANY circumstances be complacent with your job’s sole income again. Have a plan B, C, D and E already working for you on the side so that you never need to worry yourself sick at night wondering: What now?????