Cracking the Egg

Perhaps it is a bit of a strange view of things. But all the time we talk about building up our nest egg, or not putting all of our eggs into one basket. For whatever reason, eggs seem to have a lot to do with the way we think about and talk about our money.

Who knows if in the beginning what came first was the chicken or the egg? I'd have to assume it was the chicken. But who really knows? The only chickens I know are in my freezer or on my plate, so I have none to ask for their insight into the matter.

I am not sure, even if I could talk to a chicken if I could translate the answer from "Bok, bok, bagock."

Let's assume our money we earn becomes a chicken, and that chicken starts laying eggs for us. We use some of the eggs for food, of course. If we are smart, we save a few eggs to hatch into more chickens which provide more eggs.

Unless they are born into roosters and then they will lay no eggs...ahem.

But it does seem apparent that, in part, we associate the eggs and our money simply because the egg is the beginning, and the chicken is the fruit we get from it. Or the meat. Or the poultry. Anyway.

It stands to reason that throughout life if all we do is eat the eggs our chicken lays, or eat the chickens, we will ultimately have an empty basket at some point. We are just getting by, really. Never getting ahead.

In a way, when you think about it, depending on how we go about our analogy here, it can be assumed that at some point we may have a lot of chickens, and therefore a lot of eggs. A lot of baskets of eggs. More than we need, more than we can eat and so on and so forth.

And so, at some point we may be selling some of these eggs, getting more chickens and more eggs and so this convoluted analogy just gets ridiculously more deep.

Not even sure I am following myself, but onward and upward I go in any event. What do I have to lose here, besides an audience? Even my own chickens at this point might well be asking themselves, "What the cluck is this guy talking about?"

I am talking about cracking the egg theory, so to speak.

Themes you hear from me all the time are regarding saving money, replacing income, creating passive income, and ultimately building wealth. Making your money work for you in a way that you don't have to work as hard for it at some point.

Money makes money.

We hear this all the time. Most people understand what it means. Even the poor will tell you with rolled eyes, "I have to have money to make money, it's the only way." Yes. Right. So, what are you doing about that?

Look, what I am driving at here is what I started out with in this crazy little article. Balance. Although I did not use that word. I simply alluded to it. It's about how we deal with the chickens and the eggs they lay for us. How we use the eggs is up to us, and how we use them determines how many chickens and eggs we get. It determines what we can do with the chickens and the eggs once we have them in our coops and in our baskets.

When it comes to money, the real test, or the real secret if you will, is to find any way you can to make more of it. But to also think outside the box about how it is actually made. To watch others who are doing it, and learn from what they are doing, and then copy it.

Because let's be honest here. Despite popular belief, most wealthy people are self made. They were not born into it. They were not lucky. They worked for it. They earned it. They made it from nothing. They started off with one single chicken and grew their nest eggs into many eggs, putting them into multiple baskets along the way.

Hatching some into new chickens, and a few roosters to lay with the chickens and produce more eggs, and so on and so forth.

The first key is to be frugal. I mean, earn as much as you can of course. But sometimes it just happens to be that some people are destined to earn a little. There are people, for example, who's destiny it is to flip burgers their entire life. Obviously that's low wages.

But it is not the end of the opportunity.

In other words, you do not need to limit yourself by your earnings. Because how much money you make has little to do with what you can ultimately earn, and what you can ultimately be worth financially.

Again, balance. Being frugal simply allows you to stretch each dollar you do make as far as it can go. And it also frees up other money to be put into things that will grow more money for you.

The second key is to avoid debt. If you have to take out loans or use credit cards to get something, you can't afford it. Avoid that. Determine what you need and be careful about how you obtain these things.

Forget the wants in the short term. They are unnecessary and not conducive to your end game.

The third key is learning. And this is a big one. It's the one most people miss, unfortunately.

Just because you don't understand something does not mean you cannot learn more about it so that you do understand it. Take the time to figure things out, because it is in your best interest to do that. It's important. In fact, it is paramount.

If, at the end of the day, you have convinced yourself that any effort is fruitless, you are selling yourself short. You will never increase your chickens or fill your baskets of eggs this way.

"I can never get ahead because my job will only pay this much." "The system is rigged against the poor and middle class, so why bother?"

I even get the excuse all the time, "So long as we have children we can never become rich."

The reality is that poor people and middle class people, even with large families, still can become wealthy. It's all in the mindset. It's about what they do. It's about what they believe in. And it is about how they perceive their lives and their opportunities. It is about their not giving in to commonly held false narratives and negative thinking. It's about what they learn and understand about how wealth creation is really accomplished.

It's about how they understand the value of their chicken and the eggs it lays, and what they can do with what they have. How they can make the most of what they have.

Cracking the egg is really about breaking down the barriers. Most of which are self-imposed barriers.

"I only have one chicken and I must eat the eggs." This is a barrier. Not understanding that some eggs can produce more chickens, and therefore more eggs, and not understanding that having only one chicken is not the end of the road is a part of that third key.

One thing I have always done is observe people around me. I ask myself all the time, how does this guy right alongside me, doing the same job as I do, making the same money as I do, have more than I do?

How is it that another guy working alongside me, doing the same job as I do, making the same money as I do, have less than I do?

It's how they deal with their chickens and their eggs that makes the difference. How I deal with my own chicken and eggs determines my own outcome as well. In other words, you are provided the chicken. The rest is up to you.

Cracking the egg is really simply about cracking the code and figuring things out. How much you have is really a product of what you limit yourself to having. Not what others, or circumstances allow you to have.

If you never take the time and put in the effort to know and understand this, you will be forever clutching at that one chicken for your every need, praying to God that it does not become sick and die and leave with you with no means to any more eggs.

Lead image courtesy of Pixabay, user Alexandra_Koch. Eggs Easter Sales Booth - Free photo on Pixabay