Everyone is a trader!

You are not excluded.

You are a trader whether you think so or not. I will prove it to you. Everyone on earth trades all the time. We trade hours for dollars at jobs. We trade hours for more dollars when we own our own businesses and that involves trading. We business owners seek to buy wholesale and flip and sell for retail. Restaurants do this with wholesale food and retail sales. Store owners purchase in bulk and sell retail and keep the spread. Regular Joe and Sally Smith buy and sell all the time; they just do it 100% wrong and take a horrible bath all their lives.

So how are you doing? Are you losing your butt in your trading activities? Or actively flipping everything that comes to you? Or have you simply determined what you’re worth and are settling for less? A lot less than you are worth?

Consider this: Millions of people trade $100 or more for TV “programing” from the local cable company and then trade hours away siting and accomplishing nothing but being “conformed to the image of this world”. What is that really costing you?

Someone is buying a motorcycle in the fall or winter for a steal and holding it until spring, where he/she is going to flip it for 100% profit.

Someone is doing the same thing with a convertible. Is it you?

Someone on Craigslist buys every air conditioner they can get their hands on cheap in the fall/winter, packs them in a shed and blows them all out in one weekend at the very first heat wave; making thousands of dollars in one fell swoop for very little work.

Someone is finding tax sales and buying houses for peanuts, holding them for a year at 18% and getting smacked with redemptions; losing the house back to the owner who is forced to pay 18% interest. However, this man gets to keep one or two of them and on month 13 he goes in, fixes and sells for monster sick gains. Is this you? What do you do with your spare money or spare time?

Someone is buying abandoned houses and fixing and selling for crazy gains.

Someone is stealing houses from banks for $65K in repo auctions and then selling for $125K; is that you?

Why are you letting it all pass by? You have no desire to better your life in any way? Just too rich, huh? Just too much time on your hands to watch TV and sit around. Wow, I wish I was that rich. But alas, I’m not and I don’t think squandering time is a great idea.

Someone has a wallet stuffed with cash and scours Craigslist in their city looking for free or low cost stuff, grabs it the second they recognize the deal and then sells it for a double, triple or more. Is that you?

Someone spends their weekends going to thrift stores, consignment stores, etc. and looks for a quality gem like a $325 brass and pewter chess set that is being sold for $7.50. They can pop it on EBay and unload it for $100 in 7 days. Is that you?

Someone finds rare first edition books, picks them up for $1, $5 or $10 and sells them for $500 or so on EBay, Alibris and Amazon to buyers all over the world netting themselves several thousand a month in their spare time.

Is this you?

Every example I am quoting to you above and below, I actually get from folks that do it.  I know a guy who spends one Saturday a month and makes basically 3K to 4K a month doing books that way. Sure, it took him time to learn and he has many books he bought that he cannot sell or break even on but after his first two years he was making a fortune. I realize that a day a week is not really worth $50K a year to you if you’re rich. I get it.

Someone is buying up a car that needs a transmission or some other fix and they get this thing for practically nothing, drop a few thousand into it and then sell it for $5K bucks. Is this you?

What are you doing with your time? Why are you not buying, selling and building knowledge, skills and negotiation skills? Why are you not laying aside for the days to come when you’re old and weak and cannot do this? Does the Bible not tell you to “Bare the yoke in your youth”? What do you think that means? I will be happy to tell you that it means to work so that you will not have to work so hard when you are 50, 60 and 70.

I guess many Americans are happy to end up at 65 years of age, old, broke and suffering; because 80% actually do! Those are the statistics!  Eighty percent of Americans end up at 65 with nothing but one skill: “Would you like paper or plastic with that?” as they bag groceries at Wal-Mart until they cannot even work anymore. That is not enjoying your retirement if you ask me.

Why are you not teaching your children how to make cash in a thousand different ways?

Everyone is a trader. You too! Are you a bad one simply going to work for 40 to 60 hours for $10 to $15 per hour? Wow… you really have determined what you’re worth haven’t you? That is low self-esteem. Pull yourself up out of the gutter friend. Don’t sell yourself so cheap!

I contend that you should pick a skill set that you have and expand upon it. Find something you like or are interested in, and find a way to create a part time side business with it. Even if it’s just for a few hours here and there. It’s a lot better than slacking off. Bare the yoke in your youth and get busy with your spare time. Hard work never killed anyone that I know of.

Let me ask you this.  Do you trade your hard earned dollars to buy cheap garbage that will break or go bad fast so you can buy more in 6 months or a year? Is this being a good steward of God’s money and skill that He has given to you?

I knew a man 18 years ago that took $10K that he had saved up, and after buying a slice of land, spent the whole $10K to buy reclaimed wood. He scoured barn yards and dumps. He got free windows, free doors, more building materials than you could imagine for free. In 2 years of his spare time he built a very nice two story, 1,000 square foot home; all for just $10K and a ton of work. That is a lot better than going to rocket mortgage isn’t it?

Hi! I am your friendly mortgage banker. Congratulations on your home purchase Mr. and Mrs. Smith. I am sure you’re going to be very happy! Sign here (evil smile in the heart is hidden). Yeah, congratulations, you just signed on a $150K home that you will spend the next thirty years of your life paying on! Why? So a banker can have $450 thousand dollars of your money. Isn’t that just lovely and awesome? You really are a kind Joe!  Practically half of your entire life force given to an evil bankster because he needs to live in opulent riches. You see, he needs you! “The borrower is servant to the lender”, the Bible says.

Who do you serve? My guess is… if you are like the average American, you sell yourself short all day long. You shop for full retail and love it. You lust to buy things you think you need and you waste a lot of money. You serve a boss for far less than you are worth and you shell out all your funds to serve a banker, the insurance company, the car finance company, the collision insurance and the list goes on and on and on. Do you have anything left at the end of the month?

Not much? Then perhaps you should find a side thing to do, make some extra cash, dig yourself out of the debts you are in and better your life so you can be a good man or woman.

A good man leaves an inheritance to his children’s children. Is this you? Will you be that good man or woman? Or when you are 75-80 will you tell your kids how sorry you are that you squandered all your spare time away?

I know. Not your average happy website article. I get it. Sometimes love needs to be a bit tough and slap you in the face just a little bit. That is often what it takes to get people to wake up. So please think this over honestly and then find something you can do.  Pray about it and ask God to show you. Everyone that asks receives. It’s just that a lot of people won’t bother asking because they are scared of the revelation to come.

The Bible warns u in Proverbs 6:8-11 “How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? When wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man.”

Sure, it’s great to sleep and rest and just kick back and relax on thy couch but you aren’t expanding when you do that. You’re not working and gaining and increasing your life’s labors and you’re not improving your mind or skills either. I contend that all of a person’s spare time should be spent with very careful consideration as to the improvement of one’s state; mental, physical, spiritual or any other way… but not to just rest, relax and squander precious time.