Am I Having Fun Yet? Ask ChatGPT

"I’m not lost, I’m on an unplanned adventure."

(A.A. Milne, known for Winnie the Pooh books)

The above quote pretty well explains my entire life. I don't know how anyone gets to my age and still does not know the real answer to this question: What will I do when I grow up? Second chance-- third, fourth, fifth? Second childhood--

Can anyone relate? Do any of you have more pursuits than you have time to pursue? Do I need to rewrite the last sentence in past tense?

Do any of you have niche interests that you don't fully comprehend? Are you climbing up the wrong side of the learning curve, breathing heavily? But you are wildly passionate about learning a particular subject, all of it, until you reach the summit, or at least sound like more of an expert than your listener or reader. Me too.

Will You Passion Payoff?

That question isn't necessarily about money, but each pursuit does come with a cost. Pursuits cost time to learn and are, indeed, an expense that will eventually drop to the bottom line, hopefully not with a thud. Is that ROI?

This may sound more like philosophy than a business discussion. But until we examine, on a personal level, the various ways we use up our time-- and how much time said things take to accomplish, again, on a personal level, we cannot be efficient on a business level.

I know, Phil, that sentence is too long. Save me from myself. But alas, it is too late.

I guess it depends at what we want to be efficient.

It is math. In a physical lifetime, at the end of the day, everything is math.

The older we get the more we understand ROI, even if we don't understand it.

Using ROI as an example here may be simplistic, but it is one that most of us in business understand. So, maybe I'm not too far off that mark.

Consider time in terms of currency units, like each minute costs a penny, or a nickel, or a dime. What is your time worth? There must be a mathematical equation to describe this-- Of course, there is. Come on, math-heads, help me out.

I Spend Currency Units of Time

Because I Don't (Yet) Know What I Am Doing

Is This On The Job Training?

I jump into a project/s and figure I will learn it as I go. And that worked most of the time-- It is on the job training. For example, I can out-chef any (small-town) chef, including using 10" chef knife chopping techniques, though the day we officially opened our first food service business, I had never cooked anything but grass (I mean the kind that grows in your yard). My sister cooked. I drove tractors.

I'm not sure I recommend this approach, but it really does have to do with your own personality. You know who you are. Or do you?

And when you're young, you're going to do what you're going to do.

I didn't care about the cost of time back in the day, but those currency unit's of time are becoming considerably more valuable. And now it's double-triple-quadruple jeopardy.

Today's technologies change with breathtaking speed-- and I am moving half as fast as I once did.

That's life. It's math. There's an equation for that, or an algorithm.

Am I Having Fun Yet?

Well, yes, I am having a lot of fun-- most of the time, though now, with more purposeful intent. I take much care to kill more than one of those feathered time-consumers with a single stone, and I am not referring to multi-tasking, which ends up being a fruitless endeavor.

For example, I hinted earlier of pursuits in which I became wildly interested.

Over the last few years, investing (particularly crypto) and representing Wealthy Affiliate as an affiliate marketer became both personal and business interests (niches). Passions? At first, it seemed as though I had warring interests.

I find now, especially since the introduction of PPC and AI, these subjects work well together. Believe me, it took a while to see the connections. It seemed like I was working on unrelated interests.

But all the time I was learning, learning, learning on the job.

Because of reading investment news, I had already developed an interest in AI. I wrote about it here before ChatGPT was ever announced. And there is more to come because these subjects are fresh, so related, and so intriguing. And in this crazy world, so important.

An ability to roll with the punches is important. You all know there are ways to fall down-- And then, there are ways. It's better to not break bones.

Stay attached.

It all started when I signed on to Kyle's Las Vegas PPC Challenge, a subject for another day.

Am I having fun yet?

If I plotted this question and answer on an Excel chart-- and it would look just a Google Analytics graph. The lines would go up and down like a giant roller-coaster.

That may express some fun, and some not so fun. Would there be any emotion involved? No emotion. There is no room for emotion in business. It's all about the math.

Business/life requires calculated betting. You cannot be an investor (or a gambler)and be emotional.

Who says?

Don't Waste Time on Regret

I do have regrets, but I don't waste time wishing I had done things differently. That would be a foolish way to spend the currency units I have left.

However, let us use our mistakes to help others, that they might avoid said mistakes.

The blame game will never help. We must own our mistakes.

Now, I have to take some of that back. . . I admit I regret that I took my 7th grade algebra teacher to heart, when he said girls can't do math. Really?!!!

Sometimes I do waste time trying to get it perfect. Well, we will never reach perfection, but I will probably die trying, especially if takes 10,000 hours to become an expert.

Thank you for reading. I know your time is valuable.