It’s amazing to me how much lazier I am with my personal e-mail than I ever was with work e-mail.  One could argue that I was getting paid to open work e-mails and that would be true, but I signed up for these personal e-mails.  I really do want to read them and yet they go unopened, unanswered, totally neglected.  But every once in a while I get back on track.  This morning I ran across a quick e-mail from Life Edited.  I signed up for the subscription after hearing a Ted talk from the creator of the site.  Basic concept – finding products, ideas, living spaces, etc to help you live a more simplified and happy life.  You know, be more thoughtful in your purchases, buy less stuff, have less stuff, de-clutter, have a smaller footprint or as the creators of Life Edited so brilliantly describe it – “Design you life to include more money, health and happiness with less stuff, space and energy.”  Something I can totally get behind and yet, so hard to put in practice.  I’m surveying my kitchen thinking, please don’t drop by unannounced life edited peeps, my life is not very edited at this moment.  I blame the kids.

Welcome to Thursday!  Here’s a great story that I ran across this morning because I actually opened my e-mail.

The fisherman replied, “Not very long.”

The executive then asked, “Then why didn’t you stay out longer and catch more fish?”

To which the fisherman responded, “I have enough to support my family.”

“But what do you do with the rest of your time?” the executive asked.

The fisherman said, “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife, and stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos.”

The executive quickly interrupted, “I have an MBA from Harvard and can help you. You should start by fishing longer every day. You can then sell the extra fish you catch. With the extra revenue, you can buy a bigger boat. With the extra money the larger boat will bring, you can buy a second one and a third one and so on until you have an entire fleet. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman you could sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would then of course need to leave this village and move to the big city and eventually NYC where you will run your expanding enterprise.”

The fisherman then asked, “But how long will all this take?”

To which the executive replied, “Twenty, maybe 25 years.”

“And after that?” the fisherman asked.

“Afterwards? That’s when it gets really interesting,” answered the executive, laughing. “When the time is right you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You could make millions.”

“Millions? Really? Then what?”

“Then you could finally retire and move to a small coastal fishing village! There you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a siesta with your wife, and stroll to the village in the evenings where you would sip wine and play guitar with your amigos.”