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2:03 PM, Sunday, February 14th, 2016:   People often read entries like this and hold them up as accounts of my grand ego. Why would anyone commit this to public print unless they were showing off? My reply is always, what's the point of documenting your life if you're not honest? Or hold back because someone may think you're arrogant? I am every emotion depending on the hour, so what's the point of only capturing the ones that make me look good? I've been doing this for 17 years not because I think I'm special or deserve to be celebrated or some shit... this is my therapy. I write awful things about myself too. I have extremely embarassing shit in this journal and never take it down because it's who I am or who I was. I document all of this for one reason: it helps me collect my thoughts and compartmentalize my life so I can produce the most shit possible. That's honestly always been the point: accountability. I keep making these entries to fill these months because it pushes me to do more and more and more. I hype myself up in these entries so shit actually happens. I WILL GET HATS & MINIGOLF ON THE AIR.   ...except, I know damn well I may not. It's hard. Really hard. But I believe I can do it and I believe so publically. I don't care if I have egg on my face, I have zero fear of failure - not because I don't think I will, fail because I already have - DRAMATICALLY - my whole life. So what's there to fear? This is entry 1610 for fuck's sake. Who caaaaaaaaaaaaares?!!?   So I say all that to post this:     My life is embarassingly easy. I have all the time to do all the things I want to do. I can spend as much time as I want with my family, I can build ridiculous things in my backyard, I can invent new ways to give to charities THROUGH that bizarre backyard... I drive a fucking Time Machine for a living for literally unbelievable amounts of money and it affords me all the time I want to do other things. I made so much last year I could stretch it for two more. A lifetime of learning how to live meagerly means my life now is nearly 100% carefree. The only negative I can think of is I wish Talya had grown up the way I did so this didn't seem so goddamned normal to her... but clearly that's not possible. Guys, if you have your shit together? Money absolutely buys happiness. Having an extremely small overhead does as well. ("A Small Nut" as they say in "This is 40"). There's no financial stress because I'm not trying to gain financial wealth. Having a bunch of money means I have a bunch of TIME, not a bunch of THINGS... so I'm beyond elated, I'm just completely the fuck out of touch. I cannot connect with Adam at the beginning of this Journey. Thinking about his situations actually hurt my brain. It's unimaginable to me now. That's actually kind of awful, but I'm trying to be honest. I get to play make-believe in my backyard and invent new ways to play minigolf because, well, it's fun. Hats & Minigolf is INDEED really good and will get picked up in some capacity and I can spend the first couple of months this year just losing weight. And because I'm basically retired, I can lose weight with eeeeeeeeeeeeeease. My life is unbelievable and I don't know who to talk to about it. I really don't. Just rereading this paragraph makes me want to punch me in the fucking face. So what's it really like to have money not even register in your brain?   ...you just replace it with whatever is the problem of the moment. Cam is going through the terrible twos like a motherfucker. THAT is about the only thing that registers. We can actually devote time to figuring out the best way to deal with that. We absolutely have first world problem syndrome, actually one-percenter-first-world-problem-syndrome even though we're not at that income bracket, compared to our overhead? We most definitely are...   ...so can I stay grounded? I think I can. This entry probably begs otherwise, but I think I still have a good grasp on what matters. How to guide my kids or how to help Talya through some of her issues. It's been awesome being able to focus on ways to raise money for charities and holy shit is it a lot of work. Trying to connect sponsors and charities, etc... it's really fucking hard because no one takes you seriously no matter what. And we're just playing Robin Hood! We're not even asking for a dime! We're not handling the money, we're just setting up an avenue for sponsors to give with extra exposure! It's still so hard to make it all line up.   Do I worry about my kids being entitled? Not really, I know they kinda will be. Entitled might be a bit harsh, we can certainly squash some of that on the parenting end, but they will never TRULY struggle the way I did. They will always have a safety net, one I didn't have until 36. That's good and bad, but I barely think about it anymore because it just is. It's an amazing feeling and one that's difficult to process, but as I wrote in that video: this really is my job. This is how I spend my time. It's absolute freedom.   If a rich person tells you they're not out of touch with the working class, they're lying. That or they're sociopaths that just say what they think you need to hear and could never have related anyway. Money desensitizes you to stuff. I have caught myself overhearing other people talk about their lives and I'm stunned to remember that people actually have to work damn near every day at a job they don't like. Something I did my whole life and took pride in... now I think about what an unbelievable time suck that is. Think about how ridiculous that sentence is? Jobs, what life sucks. Yeah, asshole, that's how the whole fucking world works, man.   Part of it I can actually take some pride in. My talents have allowed me to solve the problems of income with efficiency and planning. I didn't consider it a sacrifice to never eat out and never buy new clothes or hardly ever buy "things" because each month I paid a mortgage. I had a house. That meant more than those other things. Even with a shitty job I had free-time to keep creating my way OUT of that job... and eventually I always did. And remarkably, the creativity didn't stop after I landed on a small fortune with RentTheDelorean.com - still not buying "things" that aren't specifically for creating more... which inevitably seems to bring in money. I guess the real trick for me is I had the balls to jump again and again and believe my talents would be rewarded, all the while lowering my need for the reward. MOST people, once the need for the reward is lowered, they stop jumping so damn much - but I discovered something mid-way through The Journey: I jump because I believe in my ideas. Not all of my ideas, but I know when it's jump-worthy and I never have really cared about the outcome, I do enjoy the journey of creating the new reality. Basically, I figured out all my shit. I figured out my issues. I started a family for the right reasons. There isn't one moment where I feel those kids kept me from ANYTHING or are keeping me from ANYTHING that I want. Being married isn't being trapped because I love not only her, I love who I am in this role as husband/father. And that's really how you have to see life. There's a whole lot of hats, which ones do you fit in? Are you ready for the 20 year committment of children? That's a hat you can't really take off without doing copious amounts of damage to someone. (I know, I know you never take it off even after 20 years, but you know what I mean).   Money hat is gone for now. I'm smart enough to realize that might not always be the case, but RentTheDelorean.com runs itself, I take the gigs that come to me and nothing else I do has anything to do with making money. It's about making art, it's about seeing how much I can raise for charity. That's fun.   If you're in the right place, money absolutely buys happiness and freedom.   Adam   PS - Also, I'm well aware of today's date and how seemingly repugnant it is to write a love letter to money - but I really want people who know me to think. You know how much I love Talya and my family, and we never celebrate this day because we're too busy kicking ass and having fun to celebrate on the days they tell us to. There's a lesson there. But if I'm being completely honest? Our life is absolutely easier and happier because of everything I wrote in this entry. It just is. Now we could make choices with the money that would decidedly make things a LOT more complicated (mo money mo problems), but when you make choices to just spend more time doing what you love? That doesn't happen. So there's your fucking valentine. Certainly not wasting money on a card or chocolate. Duh.