Scrubbing for my Dollar

To start off the month of May, I’ll write a little something about ‘greed’.

Being my bored self, I took a look at my aunt’s bookshelf, and I spotted an odd looking book, titled “DUH! The Stupid History of the Human Race”. (hmm, maybe that’s true…). I flipped to a random page in the book, which led me to “Chapter 14: Dumb Things Famous People Said.” Wow…really, really interesting…is it?

Actually, it is. Coincidentally, this quote was on the page:

“I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself.”
-Ivan Boesky, financier

I laughed to myself when I read that. In some ways, that’s true—because when you’re greedy, it’s always about yourself. Moments where you feel greedy are the moments where you feel selfish. Don’t take me wrong—you might not be a selfish person, but everyone has their own selfish moments, right?

I can’t even recall the countless moments where I’ve felt greedy. Ranging from video games to books to music, I’ve always dreamed of getting everything. I mean, if you have an amount of wealth equal to that of Bill Gates, you could just point to something you want and you’ll get it! How GREAT is that?

But then again, would you have the same feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment when you buy the item? When you work extremely hard for your money, and you actually start spending it on something, you feel good when you get it, because you know you earned it really well. I mean, you also ‘earned’ the bunches of money you have (when you’re wealthy), but when you earn less, everything you buy will seem so much more valuable. Instead of saying “Oh, wow, the newest Guitar Hero is being released tomorrow. I’ll just go tell my chauffeur to drive me there tomorrow and get it,” it’d be much more satisfying in the end if you said, “Oh, the newest Guitar Hero is being released tomorrow. Let me work hard to earn the amount of money, and then I’ll go buy it!” That way, while you’re playing the game, you’ll have a warm feeling on the inside that you worked your butt off to get this time to play.

Dang! That was a long, random ramble. I’m just sittin’ here at my aunt’s computer in San Diego typing some random article because of this random spark of inspiration from this random book I found on her random bookshelf. Yeah…random.

-the clam.