Aaron Clarey Quotes

“Counterintuitive as it may sound, you stand a much higher chance at becoming rich pursuing minimalism as opposed to slaving away for an employer. The reason is two-fold.

First, it’s nearly impossible to become rich working for somebody else. Understand while you can be promoted and make more money, the nature of your employer is to maximize profits for the owner, not you. This puts your self-interests in direct opposition to that of the owner.

Not that this is evil or bad on anyone’s part, it just is how it is.  So there will always be that force keeping your salary as low as possible. And given the all the unemployed people more than happy to take your job, your employer can deliver that threat.”

“Dire as the situation may be, there is some hope. Genuine hope, not the hope that is found in presidential speeches and pablum. Hope that is practical, real, and will yield results. However, this hope comes from the only place real hope can come from – within – which means we have to focus on ourselves and what is within our control to realize this hope and capitalize on it.

This isn’t to say that the world will turn out all roses and dachshunds, nor is it going to be the 'faux depressing type of hope' akin to when your mother would say: “Well at least you aren’t a cancerous, Ebola-infected, starving, blind quadriplegic, leper living in war-torn Ethiopia with lice!”

But at minimum this book will show you there is a future, you can live a happy life, the left will get their comeuppance, and no matter how bad it gets, there is always a way to enjoy the decline.”

“Ever since 1997 I have never had a job that required me to actually show up and physically be there. Oh sure, the boss required I show up, suffer a commute and spend thousands of dollars every year on gas and parking, but there was no real reason for me to be there. It could all be done over the internet from a home office.

The internet is a game changer in that it has made location irrelevant. It has obsoleted the corporate office and cubicle. It has rendered the billions of square footage in downtown skyscrapers obsolete. It has made commuting unnecessary.

It is only because of a bunch of close-minded, short-sighted, aging gray-hairs that people are forced to work at an office. But just because the gray hairs like doing things 'the old fashioned way', doesn’t mean you have to suffer a similar such fate.”

“The error you will make (especially men) is blaming yourself for failing to realize your dreams, when in reality it was outside of your control. It was doomed from the beginning. You do yourself no service misplacing the blame on yourself.”

“Why did you get laid off? The reality is because a bunch of inept bankers, criminal real estate developers, amoral mortgage brokers and corrupt politicians created the world’s largest housing bubble.

But ironically, the average man during the Great Recession probably took this personally, illogically blaming his sole self for the entire financial crisis of 2009. 

Worse still, men across America felt an incredible amount of guilt and shame for not being able to provide for their families. And worse than that, how many men committed suicide because of a recession that was not caused by them?

All of this can be avoided in mastering the skill of recognizing what you do and do not control.”