Are you ready to wrap up 2022 with one last burst of radical productivity?
December is probably my favorite month of the year. Not because of the holidays or the wintry weather, but because it’s a time of drawing to completion the loose ends and remaining tasks; reviewing the successes, lessons, and experiences of the year; and taking some time out to practice gratitude for all I have and to envision what I’d like to accomplish with the fresh year to come.
I start the month out with an inventory of where I stand on the goals and intentions I set back in January, and see if there are any last projects I can wrap up, any final pieces to put into place or small tasks to tick off my list.
The last week of the year—the six days between Christmas and the New Year—feel like a time-out-of-time, and I always make it a point to try and spend that week in rest and rejuvenation mode. I sleep in late, read books, take nice long baths, and let my imagination run wild, creating my roadmap for the next year.
The December schedule is below. Our session times will remain the same as the last two months, except that there will be no Weekend Warrior and no meetings the last week of 2022. I know a lot of folks will be busy traveling, visiting family, etc., but don’t forget to carve out a little time for MANDATORY REST AND REJUVENATION.
When we return to productivity sessions in January, I’d like to have a special meeting for setting intentions and envisioning what we’d each like to bring into the world in 2023. So keep a look out for January’s schedule, coming out at the end of this month.
December’s Inner Growth Theme: FILTHY LUCRE
This month’s theme is a slang expression (used ironically, here) that relates to an important, though often difficult, area of personal growth: money.
We need it. We want it. We use it every day. This medium of exchange helps us manage our responsibilities, connect with people, reach our goals, and do good in the world.
A person’s wealth (and how they use it) can be viewed as an indicator of not only material success, but also psychological-emotional health. Outside of extreme circumstances, it is fairly accurate to say that being broke is a sign of poor money or time management skills, which are a sign of psychological immaturity.
At the same time, as voluntaryists, we tend to carry a disgust about money—at least, about the type of money we are forced to use in the current system.
This is not to be confused with the left-anarchist view that money is inherently evil and should be done away with in favor of some rainbows-and-unicorns economy in which everyone magically has exactly what they need through mystical distribution ledgering. It’s not money itself that earns our disgust. We just know that the people who control the currency have some really bad ideas that they use to harm us in their never-ending scheme of tyranny and oppression.
But the basic situation remains. We live in the world, and, until we build the better alternative and convince others to use it with us, we need to use the world’s agreed-upon currency standard. How do we increase our personal effectiveness around money, while sticking to our voluntaryist principles, and perhaps contributing to the construction and adoption of those better alternatives?
Fiat, crypto, precious metals, income, banking, budgeting, debt, entrepreneurship, investing, speculation, financial skills, inflation, CBDCs…it can all be quite a lot to sort out, and that’s what we’ll be learning about and reflecting on this month. I have some very cool essays and elucidating interviews lined up, and maybe a guest post or two.
Thank you for being extremely awesome with me this year!
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-Starr
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