@Len Smith Actually, I think it's a GREAT topic! I'm preparing to start a Skool group about heart health, tentatively named "Why Is Ed Dead?" I had a heart attack (HA) in 2011 and like many (if not most) it came out of the blue. No family history of cardiac issues, my grandparents all lived to 86-96, and the only "problem" according to docs was we all have high blood lipids (ie, cholesterol). After that happened, I got curious and started doing some research, going through books and publications and learned quite a bit -- enough to realize we're being lied to by the medical community, and it should be criminal, IMHO. I went off in a couple of different directions at the time that were harder to address than I expected, so the issue faded from my mind. Then, this past September, a guy I know named Ed had a heart attack while at a conference in Denver, went to the hospital, and died a week later. He's the epitome of what docs would point to as having made lifestyle choices that would have him live out his years until he approaches 100 or whatever. But he was 59. (His death may have been the result of malpractice, although the heart attack itself was both diagnosable and preventable, which follows "normal protocols" that docs follow that results in plaque buildup accounting for 75% or so of all HA deaths -- something they obviously don't like to discuss.) Anyway, I found myself getting angry about Ed's unwarranted death and decided to look into setting up a Skool group to raise awareness about stuff most docs simply won't tell you. My point is, maybe you learned some things along the way that are worth sharing with others that your doc might not have told you either. (Eg., I hear a lot of docs still won't discuss the use of cannabis to help deal with side-effects of chemo.) Not being a doc nor a medical professional in any way, I'm looking at setting my group up as a "book-study" group where I'll pick several books I found particularly eye-opening and instructive; people will read a chapter every week; and then we'll have a live call to discuss the material. (We're NOT reading chapters live on the call, which is what a lot of people seem to think because that's what the majority of book-study groups do -- given that most are Bible Study groups.) I want to help people ingest and digest this info, not just gloss over it and hope some of it sinks in.

This is quite timely given today is "Black Friday" when everybody is pushing stuff at huge discounts to help others "complete" themselves and acquire more stuff they don't need, even if they can't afford it. I've spent a lot of time over the past 6 months or so brainstorming with ChatGPT and Claude about different product ideas I've had that I could launch. It's interesting how the conversation always comes back around to the same idea -- something that taps into my gifts, my experience, my expertise, and seems to have quite a large market ... much larger than my initial concept. Here's a round-about way of explaining it: A few days ago I was on a webinar and at the end a guy did a short presentation on some software that was about something structurally the same as my idea, but a totally different context. Only in my idea, there are two parts, and his presentation only discussed the first part. I reached out to the guy who put on the webinar and asked where the second part was; his reply was something I hear over and over: "David, you're overthinking this!" These two guys are "sales" guys. The webinar and the tool were all about "making sales". The part that was missing was what happens AFTER you close a deal -- how do you fulfill it? It's like the project plan you need to create that lets you know what deliverables are needed, when, what they'll cost and when you'll get paid. This wasn't something you order from Amazon, it's an agency deal that locks in a client for 3-6 months of follow-up work, some weekly, some monthly. Not a word was mentioned about anything after the deal was signed! Yet he thinks I'm "overthinking" things because I want to know "what comes next?" Then later that day he posted a video saying how he's putting together a BF offer (today being BF) where he'll be launching a thing next week to help all of the folks on his list who he thinks are lost and having trouble focusing and closing deals, by setting up daily webinars where people can get more training and help on "making sales" and how to close more deals.

@L T yep, had that happen. I’m eager to hear your thoughts.

@Fil Ladden You guys seem to be missing the point. It's not about "my stuff". It all triggered this thought that "the future I've been planning for is here, and most of the things I've planned for are irrelevant." I'm sure everybody has different psychological reasons for holding on to things. Sometimes they are taken away for reasons outside of our control, like your house burns down or your storage locker got auctioned off or something like that. There are people who hoard things for whatever reason; I don't consider myself one of them, although I do have a tendency to buy things in part by rationalizing that I might use it more than once. This is probably more of a comment on American society, tho, because Americans have way more stuff than people in other countries and cultures -- they're far more likely to share things within their communities than Americans are. We seem to face the opposite: we accumulate a lot of stuff then have a hard time getting rid of it because nobody wants it. eBay started as a sort of online garage sale site. Now it's so flooded with cheap crap from China that it's hard to sell used things. Scammers only make it worse. Thrift stores are great for getting rid of most stuff, but one thing they don't like to take is old books other than mostly popular ones, like record / CD stores -- I've got over 100 CDs that I took to a place that only recycles records and CDs and they didn't want any of them. But again, that's beside the point. It seems I've gotten to a place in life where most of the stuff I've got is of no value to what I'm up to now, because it was "curated" as it were for some potential use "in the future". Now that I'm here in that future, it has no place. Making matters worse, I moved into a smaller apartment and there's not just less than have of the storage space here than I had before, but the cabinets are so small that I have nowhere to put my plates or many of my kitchen things. I don't want to get rid of them, but ... they just DON'T FIT! That's just weird to me. My sister suggested I just put them into storage, and I'm thinking ,"WHY?"

I've been a software developer my entire career, with a brief hiatus to clear my head. In 2020-21 I started to get curious if I might have Asperger's and found someone to diagnose me in late 2021. The same week I got my diagnosis I received my annual review at work. I had been reading up on Asperger's (now officially a form of autism) and when I read my review, it looked like it could have been copied from a case study of how Aspie's show up at work. I told the HR person to simply replace it with a comment to that effect and then re-do the review focusing on my actual work performance and not the effects of my Asperger's in the workplace. She said my boss refused and that was that. I pointed out that it's legally considered a "disability" under ADA guidelines and they were required under law to make "reasonable accommodations", but they didn't seem to care. Not wanting to get into a big legal dispute, I said I'd leave if they gave me a longer severance package. We arrived at a number and I left. That was in January. I turned 65 in July, and in late May I decided to get off of the trading time for money merry-go-round and start collecting Social Security, and so I filed in June. Unfortunately, I'm one of the majority of Boomers who doesn't have enough saved up to retire on, so I promptly filed for Bankruptcy to flush out a bunch of debts I could no longer afford to pay. Ironically, I blew what retirement funds I had accumulated over the years trying to AVOID BANKRUPTCY, and looking back on it, I'd say that was a BIG MISTAKE! Life goes in cycles, along with our finances, and about every 10-12 years I could have filed BK. Looking back, that's what I should have done instead of using my retirement funds to avoid it. For the record, you can use retirement funds to avoid a BK, but a BK cannot touch your retirement funds. A BK is not fun, and it's a bit like living in a financial hurricane for a few years (unless you have a magical way of recovering financially), but it does eventually calm down and get better.

@Fil Ladden I was actually planning to retire at 70. I kind of got thrown overboard and ended up in retirement. But since My Aspergers/autism diagnosis, I've come to see a lot of things I've been criticized for over the years have actually been gifts I have that aren't being expressed well. So for me, this has been about redefining who I am, and I'm making some great headway. So I've ended up where you're pointing at, but in a roundabout way. I'm really happy not having to be a player in somebody else's game, and am building the foundation of my own. It's a little messy and uncomfortable, but I'm OK with that.

Not me. I think the last time I made even a small effort was around 1980. When people tell you your whole life that you're "weird" and "different", I can't really see the point of dressing up to LOOK weird and different. Actually, I think I went to a party once with a funky hat on and people would ask what I'm supposed to be, and I'd say, "weird and different" and they'd give me a strange look and then just nod. Too meta I guess.