Two shoe salesmen are sent to deep Africa to sell shoes.  The first one sends back a report saying, “Situation dismal.  No market potential here.  No one wears shoes.”  The second one sends back a report saying, “Situation fantastic!  Massive market potential here!  NO ONE WEARS SHOES!”

About a year ago, I was sitting at the airport waiting for a flight.  Two couples were sitting next to me, I assume married couples.  They were discussing the airline’s feature where if a plane is full, if you volunteer to give up your seat, the airline hands you a free round-trip ticket to anywhere in the continental United States or Mexico.  It’s a pretty cool deal and I’ve already done this once.

The conversation I listened to was disturbing, as are many conversations I hear when I listen to normal people.  It went something like this:

Wife: Oh wow!  Anywhere in the US or Mexico?   Damn that would be cool!

Husband: We could never use a ticket like that.

Wife: Why not?

Husband: It doesn’t matter if we get a free plane ticket.  We could never afford to stay in a hotel or pay for taxis and stuff like that.

Second Woman: Well, maybe if the ticket could be usable in a year or two, then you two could do it.

Husband: Yeah right.  It would have to be a decade or two.

All I had to do was listen to this 20 second exchange to know exactly why this guy was poor.  He thought he was poor, and he was convinced he would always be poor.  This guy was reasonably young, perhaps about 30.  At 30, he could not afford a cheap hotel and one or two taxi rides, and moreover was convinced he would not be able to afford these things at age 40 or 50.

A lot has been written about having a positive attitude.  I’m talking here about having a positive future view of your own life.  Though I am very pessimistic about the future of things like the United States (and most of the western world), western culture, the economy, and things like that, I have always had a very positive future view regarding me and my own life.

I remember when I was 18 years old, living on my own, standing in the grocery check-out line hoping beyond hope that my $300 limit student VISA card would be able to accept the $13 charge for the food I was buying so I could eat that night.  It was not fun.  Yet, I remember how happy I was back then because I knew someday soon I’d be making $100,000 a year, even though I wasn’t really sure how I was going to do it.

I was able to keep my spirits high during my divorce because I knew I would soon be fucking lots of young hot babes, even though I had no idea how to go about doing it.

When I see a romantic relationship I have with a woman in jeopardy, I’m still a happy guy because I know she’ll be back into my life at some point and I know that there are women just as smart, hot, and cool as she is right around the corner waiting for a guy just like me.

While I’m not 100% perfect on it 100% of the time, I am very good have having a positive future view.  Always have been, starting at around age 16.  It’s worked very well for me.

Whenever I see guys say things like:

“Women won’t let you fuck other women.”

“I’ll never make more than $70,000 a year.  Guys who make that much work too hard.”

“The only women who agree to open relationships are the dumb trashy kind.”

“Really hot chicks don’t like me.”

“I can’t do THAT!  She’ll break up with me!”

“I can’t do THAT!  She might get pissed!”

“I’m too fat / short / old / poor to <fill in the blank>.”

“You don’t understand dude.  If we break up, it will be years and years before I find another girl as good as her.”

These are all guys with a negative future view (at least usually).  If you ever, ever assume a negative outcome in a major area of your own life, you need to come to a complete stop and re-orient your thinking.  What you’re doing is extraordinarily dangerous to your future and your life.

Don’t be that guy in the airport.  I would not want to be him.

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