WHAT IS YOUR SPENDING LIMIT?
I'm in one of my deep-thinking modes. Uh-oh, you say. Well, this is important to me and I didn't realize how much so until I spent the last hour or so on my swing in the rainy darkness, eating a bowl of Breyer's Coffee ice cream and pondering a post Anomie-Atlanta shared today. Please check that out real quick, including the ensuing comments. Give it a bit of thought, forgive my thievery and come back here and read.
I've been searching in vain for a relevant definition of Currency to suit my purpose here and decided to invent my own...
Currency: The means by which one survives; The medium one uses to trade for one's needs and desires.
Now, let me ask you this, Reader. What is your currency?
Before you answer, ask yourself a couple questions. . . "What is my greatest need?" and "What means do I use to have that need satisfied?"
Lots of people "spend" their reserves in a myriad of ways. Some people use money to get love. Some people use humor to get attention. Some people use dishonesty to get power. Some people use money to get sex. And vice-versa, no pun intended... Some people use (other's) fear to get power. Some people use sex to get love. Some people use knowledge to get wealth. Some people use animals to get sex. (Oops, did I really type that?) Anyway, my point is that people use lots of different means to get what they want or need. And often, in searching for what it is that they need the most, will exhaust every means available to them. Someone who craves attention for example, (I, personally, cannot identify with this particular neurosis... wink wink) may go to great extremes using humor, innuendo, etc, to the point of feigning ignorance or relying on feminine wiles or shock value just for a crumb of attention to be tossed her way. Can you imagine that sort of pitiful desperation??? Nor can I...
Back to the serious side of this. I'm not a person of great wealth in the monetary sense. Plying unsuspecting victims with cash and gifts to get what I need is not an option, and if it were I would not be one to avail myself to that sort of shallow attempt at procurement. I am way more into "genuine." In addition to the comment I left over at A-A's, (which as I check presently and find that due to comment moderation, does not yet appear...) my currency is what I find in my heart; kindness, understanding, compassion, faith, humor -such as it is, and whatever else seems to do the job, depending on my needs of the moment. The cool thing aboot this currency is that it not only satisfies my needs but that of others, often. Unlike cold hard cash which is not only cold and hard but dirty and often in short supply, my currency is always available and not limited to banking hours or whether or not you have a balance. More like automatic withdrawal, if you will. No PIN necessary. No paybacks expected or inferred, often. An IOU, maybe, depending on circumstances. An overdraft? We all know what it is like to be emotionally drained, but even then, one can always force at least a smile or a wink that says oh-so-much.
To interject here, before I am misinterpretted- The word "use" can have negative connotations. I do not mean to imply here that I "use" anything inside me to "get things"... I'm referring to a simple give and take that just usually happens in everyday life without much conscious effort.
I know people who are real tight-wads with their currency, I guess that is their prerogative. But I believe you get what you pay for. I know people who are downright philanthropistic (?!) and I tend not to take them too seriously for they seem a bit frivolous in their spending...
I meant this post to be more serious and soulful than it's turned out to be. Dammit. I'm not even sure I'm conveying exactly what I want to say. I hope I'm at least making you think. I think a person's currency that they chose to spend says an awful lot aboot their character. It is a great indicator of how they see life and what is and isn't important to them. I don't want to hang with someone who uses money to get attention. I wouldn't trust my life to someone who uses dishonesty to get much of anything. I would rather be loved by someone poor in a monetary sense who is rich in kindness and faith any day.
The quote I love from Lester Bangs that you see up there by my picture means this to me: Even when I am down and out, fearful, depressed, on my last nerve or at the end of my rope, if I can reach down into my soul; into the reserves of my currency and still afford to reach out to another person with even only a smile or a kind word, then I am rich beyond all definitions. That is my truth.
Love, friendship, and smiles are like currency. If they are hoarded, no one gets the benefit of them. — Nellie Revell.
$ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $
I'm in one of my deep-thinking modes. Uh-oh, you say. Well, this is important to me and I didn't realize how much so until I spent the last hour or so on my swing in the rainy darkness, eating a bowl of Breyer's Coffee ice cream and pondering a post Anomie-Atlanta shared today. Please check that out real quick, including the ensuing comments. Give it a bit of thought, forgive my thievery and come back here and read.
I've been searching in vain for a relevant definition of Currency to suit my purpose here and decided to invent my own...
Currency: The means by which one survives; The medium one uses to trade for one's needs and desires.
Now, let me ask you this, Reader. What is your currency?
Before you answer, ask yourself a couple questions. . . "What is my greatest need?" and "What means do I use to have that need satisfied?"
Lots of people "spend" their reserves in a myriad of ways. Some people use money to get love. Some people use humor to get attention. Some people use dishonesty to get power. Some people use money to get sex. And vice-versa, no pun intended... Some people use (other's) fear to get power. Some people use sex to get love. Some people use knowledge to get wealth. Some people use animals to get sex. (Oops, did I really type that?) Anyway, my point is that people use lots of different means to get what they want or need. And often, in searching for what it is that they need the most, will exhaust every means available to them. Someone who craves attention for example, (I, personally, cannot identify with this particular neurosis... wink wink) may go to great extremes using humor, innuendo, etc, to the point of feigning ignorance or relying on feminine wiles or shock value just for a crumb of attention to be tossed her way. Can you imagine that sort of pitiful desperation??? Nor can I...
Back to the serious side of this. I'm not a person of great wealth in the monetary sense. Plying unsuspecting victims with cash and gifts to get what I need is not an option, and if it were I would not be one to avail myself to that sort of shallow attempt at procurement. I am way more into "genuine." In addition to the comment I left over at A-A's, (which as I check presently and find that due to comment moderation, does not yet appear...) my currency is what I find in my heart; kindness, understanding, compassion, faith, humor -such as it is, and whatever else seems to do the job, depending on my needs of the moment. The cool thing aboot this currency is that it not only satisfies my needs but that of others, often. Unlike cold hard cash which is not only cold and hard but dirty and often in short supply, my currency is always available and not limited to banking hours or whether or not you have a balance. More like automatic withdrawal, if you will. No PIN necessary. No paybacks expected or inferred, often. An IOU, maybe, depending on circumstances. An overdraft? We all know what it is like to be emotionally drained, but even then, one can always force at least a smile or a wink that says oh-so-much.
To interject here, before I am misinterpretted- The word "use" can have negative connotations. I do not mean to imply here that I "use" anything inside me to "get things"... I'm referring to a simple give and take that just usually happens in everyday life without much conscious effort.
I know people who are real tight-wads with their currency, I guess that is their prerogative. But I believe you get what you pay for. I know people who are downright philanthropistic (?!) and I tend not to take them too seriously for they seem a bit frivolous in their spending...
I meant this post to be more serious and soulful than it's turned out to be. Dammit. I'm not even sure I'm conveying exactly what I want to say. I hope I'm at least making you think. I think a person's currency that they chose to spend says an awful lot aboot their character. It is a great indicator of how they see life and what is and isn't important to them. I don't want to hang with someone who uses money to get attention. I wouldn't trust my life to someone who uses dishonesty to get much of anything. I would rather be loved by someone poor in a monetary sense who is rich in kindness and faith any day.
The quote I love from Lester Bangs that you see up there by my picture means this to me: Even when I am down and out, fearful, depressed, on my last nerve or at the end of my rope, if I can reach down into my soul; into the reserves of my currency and still afford to reach out to another person with even only a smile or a kind word, then I am rich beyond all definitions. That is my truth.
Love, friendship, and smiles are like currency. If they are hoarded, no one gets the benefit of them. — Nellie Revell.
$ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $
posted by One Wink at a Time at 4:40 AM
3 Comments:
i agree w/ most of everything you write here. i'm not into ppl trying to buy love or ppl who use money or anything to get attention... not into that at all. money is big here and many marry for money only. you find women that marry men twice the age of them for money. i don't agree w/ it and would rather marry for love than money. i think money is the root of all evil, matter of fact.
i buy what i need when i need it. sometimes i buy just if i want something, but i've never understood ppl who go out and spend, spend, spend. i know lots of ppl here that love to do this, but i see it all as a waste of time.
so... in saying all of this, i feel that my currency is the love, patience, caring attitude, willingness, openness... and all that i give to the ppl that i care for and for those that touch my heart.
a lot of ppl need more money than what they have, and you need money to live, but it's not the end all to all end alls.
Your thoughts here are I'm sure why some of us stick around in the blogosphere. If you don't have heart, then you just aren't human, are you? And what good are we if we aren't at least human?
TOONERS: You sound like my kinda ppl. :-)
SIMON: I seldom "stop spending" for the reasons you cite. I figure it all evens out in the end when I "cash it in", for the most part, anyway. Mostly, I get what I pay for but I get free stuff too, I guess it's all in what you're willing to part with.
MARK: I totally agree with you. You must be a rich man. :-)
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