Life Management: Matter vs. experiences

I?ve decided to invest more in experiences than matter. I find that new experiences bring happiness, they teach you about life and bring ?return-on-investment?, i.e. ROI, whereas most consumables only have a limited ROI.

Certain equipment such as the computer, telephone and printer are of course essentials and as important as, say, the hammer used to be in olden times. But plasma televisions, champagne whisks, yachts or summer cottages often bring a negative ROI. Your money is left in the shops and will never come back.

These days it?s often far more profitable to hire rather than buy certain consumables. You will never have to spend endless hours fixing your yacht if you hire one for a week, whatever the cost. Or even better, tag along on your mate?s yacht.

As you can?t move your summer cottage to the Greek islands (unless it was there to start with), it?s a better idea to hire a cottage for one sunny week in Finland, have another week in Greece and perhaps a third in Thailand, when life takes you to those shores. By the same token, you rid yourself of the compulsory every-summer labour camp.

It?s far too painful to haul your skis, golf set, surfboards and other bulky sports equipment with you around the world, and personally I?ve given up long ago (also, airlines tend to slap hefty surcharges on them). Any reasonable ski resort will loan you new skis for reasonable price, and good foreign golf courses give you a proper golf set with no problem. I have discovered this first hand, at the same time as my own skies and golf set are rotting away in storage as I scout around the world?s golf and ski resorts. In other words, I won?t be buying new sets anytime soon, if ever.

Experiences, on the other hand, are compact ? heaps of them fit into a small space. And you can relive them if you write them down, memorise them or take photos. And as I said, experiences always come handy later in life: I would have never entered the business world in Latin America, had I not holidayed there first and seen for myself that the part of the world has top potential. Several important acquaintances have been made and consolidated on ski slopes, golf courses and travelling to the four corners of the globe.

Published at 15:41

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