As capital rushes faster around the globe, leaving air pockets, as governments impose bans on cash, as countries prepare to convert to electronic currencies, as cryptocurrency markets get hacked, as governments bonds begin their inevitable crash, as checkpoints are being set up to confiscate precious metals, as house prices are falling and taxes on housing are rising… people are asking: WHERE DO I PUT MY MONEY?
Someone asked me this very question, and without thinking I said “buy dollars and gold”. It makes sense_—_but after giving it some more thought, I had a better answer. So by way of better answering their question, I’m writing this post.
1. Consider your most important asset to be your health. Without your health, you cannot do much else.
2. Consider the second most important asset to be any tangible resources that contribute to your health_—_food, water, medication, sanitation, and accommodation that protects you from variable elements. You need these things. If they’re not with you nor accessable within walking distance, you do not have them. To access these things, you need to have them in your possession. They are no good in the supermarket shelf. They are no good in the ground. If you do not possess these things now, its an assumption to think you have claim on them in the future.
3. Consider the third most important asset to be any knowledge or tool that converts potentially life-giving resources into things that can be used to actually contribute to survival and wellbeing. Perhaps you know how to fish. Perhaps you know how to turn stagnant water into potable water. Perhaps you know how to make a ballast to power a hydroponics unit, and bring seed to crop. Perhaps you know how to extract a tooth or repair a wound.
4. Consider the forth most important asset to be your support network of family and friends, and the collective knowledge and resources they have in their possession. These are people WITHIN WALKING DISTANCE. Not people you can Skype. Not people you text. Not people in the next city. If you break your arm, those people cannot help. Your immediate contacts are, without resources and knowledge of your own, your best chances of maintaining your most important asset_—_your health.
5. The fifth most important asset you can have is the specific resources available in your locale. Again, these are resources that can be picked up and carried. How far are you prepared to walk to find wood to chop and carry it back? Felling a tree is an art, and hard work if you’ve never done it before. Walking eight hours, non-stop is difficult enough, even without luggage. Will these resources be compromised? How can you guarantee that the resources in your locale will be secured?
Beyond these five assets, you can make the following assumptions:
Assume any asset involving a government (a property) will be taxed at the governments’ will.
Assume anything that bypasses the government (gold, cash, bitcoin) will be confiscated, if discovered.
Assume if you can’t hold it in your hand, carry it on your back, or load it into a car that runs, then it is already lost. Assume if you’re not prepared to defend it, the same applies.
All of the above, of course, is determined by a paradigm of survival. The most valuable asset is your health, if you think survival the name of the game. Survival of the physical body is one thing, but there are other schools of thought. Some say the top priority is spiritual evolution. In that case, your most important asset is your own realisation, and death is nothing to be feared. Some have an unconscious death wish. Those people may want to live on a fault line, near a volcano, or low-lying land that’s prone to tsunami. Some say hedonism is the most important aspect to life. For those people, they’ll party hard and die fast.
The most confusing part of life on Earth is how to live. Finding the best way to live has inspired religions and lifestyles, and yet none have a definitive answer. There are so many ways to live that it’s easier to throw your hands up and simply say “buy dollars and gold.” Though physical Dollars and Gold are probably good trades right now, there are no guarantees that you’ll be able to easily swap out of them, and into the next thing. That’s why, if you have the five most important assets down, it won’t matter if you bought dollars and gold or not.