Good Money

A few days ago I heard someone use the term “good money”, a comment that I have heard quite often over the years. “Good money”, as far as I can tell, means that that person makes a lot of money for what they do.

Obviously, “good money” is a relative term. In this case a Waffle House server said that the cook there made “good money”. She went on to say that he makes about $16/hour. Since a server there typically makes about $4/hour plus tips, I’m sure $16/ hour to her sounds pretty good.

I’m sure that you, like I, have also heard the expression “chasing good money after bad.”  This can mean a lot of different things, but the gist of it is what happens when you refuse to cut your losses, when you keep putting time and money into a losing endeavor.  This leads to a couple of economic terms: “sunk cost” and “sunk cost fallacy”. A “sunk cost” is an expense that cannot be recovered regardless of the outcome. The “sunk cost fallacy” occurs when a business refuses to give up on a project because of all the time and money that has already been invested. This phenomenon applies to individuals as well as businesses.  Let’s say that you have non-refundable tickets to a concert. However, the day of the concert you’re sick and don’t feel like going, but you go anyway so that you don’t “lose your money.” Now you’re at the concert, but you can’t enjoy it because you feel so bad. So now you’ve lost the money and your night in bed recuperating.  Another aspect of the “sunk cost fallacy” is that the more time and money you’ve put into the endeavor, the greater the temptation to keep going even though it’s not working. Could this phenomenon apply to a relationship? I think so.

The first time I heard the term “good money” was when I was a teenager working for fifty cents an hour at the Levi Theater in Enterprise, Alabama. An associate who made the same as I did referenced a truck driver he knew who made $300 a week!  And he said that he made “good money.”  If you do the math, taking into consideration that the trucker drove about twelve hours a day, six days a week, then the pay wasn’t all that good after all. But $300/week sounded a lot better to a teenager than fifty cents an hour.

Part of my compensation at the Levi Theater was that I could see as many movies as I cared to free of charge. Now, theoretically, I’m making “good money!” Unfortunately, since I lived in a staunch Southern Baptist household,  my parents didn’t let me go to very many movies. So scratch that “good money” comment. Now I’m just making “money". And not much of that.

So how much money do you have to make in 2019 for it to qualify as “good money”? Not very much. It just has to be more than someone else who’s doing about the same thing for less. For the record, I wouldn't take any amount of money to be a Waffle House cook. Would I be an air traffic controller? Maybe. But not a Waffle House cook. After about an hour, I would be "covered and smothered" regardless of how much money I made. 

Feeling Good--Emotional Resources

During the 1980s, groundbreaking research by neuroscientists, neuroanatomists, and molecular biologists offered hope to those who are chronically anxious, prone to worry, subject to panic attacks, depressed and other negative emotions (stuck in grief, etc.). That research continued to be espoused in books like Feeling Good by David D. Burns in 2008 and recently in books like How Emotions Are Made by Lisa Barrett. The gist of all of these books and research is that emotions are controlled by our body chemistry, but the good news is that we control that chemistry. Turns out, our thoughts and our habits control that system. For example, you choose whether or not to intake opioids and other chemicals that you introduce to your body.  At first these “mind-altering drugs” make you feel good by manipulating this body chemistry. But after a while when these feel good biochemicals, such as dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin and endorphins(d.o.s.e.), are depleted, you take these drugs not to feel good, but so you don’t feel bad. Since emotional resources are limited, your body no longer has the capacity to flood your system with these happy hormones(neurotransmitters), regardless of  how much of these foreign substances you ingest. You take  more, or inject more and more of these drugs to feel progressively worse. This pattern can lead to all the feelings you’re trying to avoid and ultimately to overdoes and suicide. You choose whether or not to eat responsibly and to exercise, both of which have a dramatic impact on releasing these happy hormones (d.o.s.e.). You choose what you think about. You can focus on some negative memory or event or you can choose to think about something good or happy. All of this affects whether or not your body is releasing d.o.s.e. or powerful chemicals such as adrenalin and cortisol, both of which can make you feel worse than you already do. Your nervous system tries to accommodate the way you want to feel.

Body chemistry is complicated. If you study the naturally occurring chemicals in your entire nervous system (your whole body), then you will become familiar with terms like synaptic connections, neuron-firing patterns, biochemical reactions, neurotransmitters, synapses and receptor cells. These body actions are the tip of the biochemical iceberg that influence your emotions. You will learn that “gut-reaction” is an actual physical and biochemical reality. Turns out there are more emotional-controlling biochemicals in your gut than in your brain.

If your formative years were in the 60s and 70s, as mine was, you heard the term “bummed out.”  This term originated with hippies as they dealt with the aftermath of drug experiences from psychedelic drugs such as LSD and “magic mushrooms.”  No doubt a “good trip” was nothing short of incredible—for example, seeing the notes coming out of the musical instruments, seeing the process of photosynthesis in a leaf. But the body had shot its wad and because of limited emotional resources these flower children were left with nothing but neurotransmitters such as cortisol in their system and bad feelings. Worse than that were the “bad trips” when the experience was negative and even horrifying.

Descartes is credited with saying, “I think, therefore I am.” If you want to overcome negative emotions, you must start by altering what you think about at any given time of day. Your thoughts, because of all of the above, control much of how you feel. The lines from the song Whistle a Happy Tune in The King and I include, “Make believe you’re brave and the trick will take you far. You can be as brave as you make believe you are.” To overcome negative emotions, you must discover and nurture positive emotions. Is it as simple as that? Not really, but it's a good start toward feeling good. 

Feeling "bummed out"? “A happy tune” can change those feelings in a hurry.

Emotional Resources

My counselor and I are working on this idea of “emotional resources.” In a few words he said, “David, we all have a limited amount of emotional resources. We all have to decide how to spend them.” I am finding that to be a very powerful statement. As an example, for years my extended family converged on the family beach house at Laguna Beach, Florida for the fourth of July weekend. The group included my grandmother, her sister, my aunts and uncles, my mother and father, my siblings, my cousins, my wife, our son and his cousins.   There were about 25 of us in all. Besides spending time in the “cottage” (slept all 25 people), we also played on the beach. My uncle always brought a boat and we went water skiing at “Phillips Inlet” about eight miles from the house. I had learned to ski and even to slalom at an early age and was really good on that ski. It was great fun for all of us. I had a reputation for being able to all but fall in  the water, regain my balance and keep skiing (they say it’s not bragging if you did it).

So what does remembering this family gathering have to do with “emotional resources”?  It  has everything to do with them.  This morning as I remembered those gatherings for over 30 years I felt a wave of sadness.  All but one uncle of that generation above me died several years ago.  I have lost touch with most of those cousins. Well really, all but one of them.  My sister, brother and I live in adjoining states and I only see them on  rare occasions. The beach house was sold to a stranger  years ago.  I don’t know who owns it now. So adding all that up, for a few minutes I felt pretty crummy about all of that. Then I heard my counselor say, “You have to decide how you spend your limited emotional resources.”  In this case I decided not to spend them in sadness over what was such a fabulous family tradition.  In spite of the losses, I chose to remember how good it was to be together with my extended family for all those years (and all those years ago).

The internet definition of  “emotional resources” includes this “:

“Emotional resources are the most important resources because it keeps people from returning to old habits. A lack of emotional resources refers to being able to choose and control emotional responses, particularly to negative situations, without engaging in self-destructive behavior.” I think something was not quoted correctly as it’s the employment of “emotional resources” that keeps us from “engaging in self-destructive behavior” and not the lack of them. Or possibly it’s saying, “Since there is a ‘lack of emotional resources’ you have to “choose and control emotional responses.”  In either case, thinking about all of this has really helped me to deal with my feelings prompted by memories of past situations. This has also helped me to deal with the current news cycle as I am deeply disturbed by so much that I read and see. I have to choose not to deplete my “emotional resources” on things that I can’t control (which is nearly everything).

The definition above also includes that “emotional resources are the most important resources.”  It doesn’t state that they are some of the most important resources or are among the most important resources, it states that “emotional resources are the most important resources.”  That includes a lot of resources!  That suggests that “emotional resources” are more important than, for example,  financial resources and relationship resources.  And if you think about it you will understand why.  It’s not what we have or who we hang out with  that makes us feel good or bad, but it’s how we think about and respond to other resources that makes us feel good or bad.

I have recently been introduced to a Christian singer named Audrey Assad. Her song "Drawn to You" has come to mean much to me.  One lyric in particular touches me every time. "After everything I've had, after everything I've lost, I'm still drawn to you.  "Drawn to 'you' doesn't have to be God or Jesus or anything of a spiritual nature' , it can be anything or anyone where you find hope, love and joy instead of grief, pain and sadness. Independence Day is as good a day as any to begin taking ownership of your emotions. It's not what has happened to us that affects the way we feel but how we choose to remember these things, how we think about them. I challenge you to discover your emotional resources and to use them to find joy and fulfillment.