Easy Does it

I love a little Pacific Island phrase I learned in a kid’s song* at Teacher Training College, “fai fai lemu” or in Palagi it translates as “take it easy“.

For a guy who loves to hit things hard, like as in 100%, 100% of the time, its interesting and sobering to see others suffer as a result of hitting things too hard. I want to scream out to them - “Easy does it” to save their own bacon . . .

We recently had a round of employment applications to fill a junior web developer position in Go Kiwi Internet. All the usual suspects applied - you know, the ones where they were currently working in Woolworths, and wanted a “real” job; the ones who had yet to learn English skills; the immigrant brain surgeons from Pakistan that were currently driving taxis; the IT gurus who wanted $4,000.00 per hour but only if we were lucky enough to be permitted to employ them.

Then there was one guy who was all gung-ho, super fizzed up and ready to go, offering to work for nothing, insisting on an appointment, but with no experience. I felt like saying to him - “Hold on mate - take it easy, slow down a bit otherwise you’ll burn everyone around you, including yourself”.

You see the statistics on people who gain easy money and watch most of them lose it all in quick time. The reason this happens, as I see it, is that the skills and discipline to manage such resources have not been learnt.

I look over my working career and see the same thing. When growth has come steadily it has been solid. Whenever I have attacked something and gone for the “big kill” it usually hasn’t gone according to plan, but the more successful ventures have been whenever I have attempted to build something for the long-term.

In the early days of the Internet, the media would highlight success stories, usually when some teenager made a killing with a great idea on the Internet, typically from his bedroom. This was a disaster for web developers and businesses because their expectation was that they too would all make a killing on the Internet. When they didn’t, the web developer would often cop the flak. “Easy does it please, Mr Customer”. Keep your expectations real and all will go well. Build your online presence and online business steadily, and the Search Engines will recognise you as a leader in your field and you’ll have something of value.

Go Kiwi Internet is a successful company (albeit maybe an unspectacular one) because it has built a solid base of small regular income off a large number of customers. It has far more value than many other web development houses who do bigger jobs, but who would devalue quickly if or when sales stopped, or the market took a dive. Easy does it - building a long-term business steadily is more like the turtle than the hare.

I was dealing with a car rental company recently and was interested to learn that most car rental companies lease their hire equipment, but this guy buys his gear outright and owns it. That’s the company I’d be more interested in investing in. A guy who owns his stock, rather than leasing it is in a much better position to handle a downturn than the others. All it would take is a little downturn and any highly geared business is immediately exposed.

I’ve always struggled with the logic of leasing equipment. It strikes me that while the tax write-off is technically a benefit, it’s a bit of a balancing act justifying lease over a purchase. I may be old-school on this but it makes more sense for me to own something at the end of the day than to send it off to someone else to sell after three years and end up with nothing.

They say that the generational behaviour pattern for wealth management is that the first generation earns it; the second generation retains it; and the third generation loses it. Sometimes I think I’m in the latter category but I’d really like to think of myself in the first category. Give me another generation and I’ll probably get there!

I was involved in a business deal with a guy a while back who got caught up in chasing the “big deal”. There was going to be gazillions of dollars coming in the door from this one big deal with one client. It started off with a hiss and a roar, only for me to have to help resurrect the deal a couple of times, and in the end I hear that it ended up a real problem for the guy. Better to stick to your knitting and take it easy, building things steadily.

A while back I accosted the pastor of my church (poor guy) with some hair-brained scheme to profit-share one of my new business ventures with him - actually with the church, not him personally. He kindly heard me out and then gently suggested that rather than find ways to make him a million dollars that a little regular offering of something appropriate might be more in order. That was his way of saying “Take it easy!” Of course the million-dollar dream I shared with him ended up as just that - a dream. Wise man, that pastor guy.

In the religious circles I mix in, there’s a word we use, “Sanctification”, to describe the process of becoming like Christ. I’m not talking about becoming a religious freak, then preaching to the rabble and making a big scene on a cross somewhere. It’s more about bringing maturity into our behaviour. Taking responsibility for ourselves ready to face our Maker. Working out what the good book says, and then applying it. Listening to God when He talks to us and being obedient, building a better character and faith. All the good things.

Sanctification isn’t ever a finished thing in this life because until we die we’re all dealing with “stuff”. The thing that I’ve learned about Sanctification though, is that while we can certainly have momentary revelations (the shrinks call it the “Ah-hah!” moment, you know, when the penny drops?) you really can’t push this Sanctification process along. Throwing a bit more money at it, or giving it an extra dollop of willpower, or trying to intellectualise it doesn’t change it much.

Building wealth, character and bettering ourselves is a life-long thing that is best to be done steadily, one step at a time, building wisdom, health and wealth steadily. Like the wise man Solomon says in his Proverbs:

An inheritance gained hastily at the beginning will not be blessed at the end.
Proverbs 20:21

Even though I work hard and play hard, I can still schedule time for R & R. I still spend time with my family, accommodate change, sleep well, snuck in a game of golf every now and then and take time to read the good book (and lots of others besides)!

Sure, it’s a balancing act to hit things at 100% and still take it easy but it is possible - after all we do have 24 hours in a day!

It’s the VICTUS IN AMBITUS way to look to the long-term, taking it easy, step by step, oh and maybe hitting it 100% as well!

* Savali vali means go for a walk
Tautalatala means too much talk
Alofa ia te oe means I love you
Take it easy; fai fai lemu