Game of life and it's rule...............1

The above picture is an illustration that we will use to understand the game of life & its rules. 

Let's try and understand the picture in detail, the chess pieces on top of tables represents the various responsibilities that we all try to handle and fulfill.  Some of these responsibilities are big and important, while others are small and petty. Some responsibilities are short term while others are either medium-term or long term. 

Responsibilities like buying a new dress for your loved ones or taking them out for a dinner or movie are short term responsibilities.

Paying for the education of your kids, getting someone treated for some ailment in the family or buying a house can be considered or termed as medium-term responsibilities.

Feeding your family and taking care of your loved ones, may appear to be a small responsibility, but actually are long term responsibilities.  

There are two tables in the picture, one has only one leg, while the other table has four legs. Is there any logic for this or just like that? Any guesses?

Yes, there is a logic behind this. But before we understand the logic about these tables, let's spend some time understanding what happens to the legs of these tables.

As we all know that, nothing in this universe is immune to the forces of nature, so are the tables and it's legs. 

"Change is the only thing which is constant."

Some of the forces which constantly keep working on tables and its legs and in most of the cases weakening them are:

a) Technology Changes: Classic example, how the change in technology can throw you out of the market is Kodak.

b) Financial unrest: Due to change in market trends, preferences, customer base, and other factors, business and due to government policies & decisions government employees are also not immune to financial unrest/uncertainty. The recent economic slowdown and changes in government policies are good examples to look at.

c) Political unrest: Though this factor appears to be not impacting business directly but this factor plays a very vital role behind the scenes and has a deep and far-reaching impact not only on business and finance but society as a whole. Political parties with different ideologies have different priorities and they accordingly support & promote policies,  business segments and development plans.

d) Professional Competition: Another reason, that weakens your earning prospects, and this is not restricted to individuals but also business undertakings. Coupled up with technological advancement, this can be detrimental.  

e) Natural calamities: COVID-19 / Corona is self-explanatory. No further explanation or discussion s required on this. This epidemic has changed the world a lot and is still changing the world and by the time we will be in the new normal phase, the world will not be the same as we sue to have at the beginning of 2020.

f) Socio-economic changes: Changes in social and economic set-up also have far-reaching impacts on ones earning capacities.  In today's time, the world is becoming more or less like a global village and changes in one part of the world have an impact on the rest of the world.  Individuals may think that they are immune to changes, but this is wrong, if you are part of this world, the extent to which you get impacted may vary, but none of us can be immune to changes.

g) Heath: Though this is last on the list it is the most important aspect, today one can be hail and hearty, prime of your health and can put in extra hours if required. But as we all know that due to erratic lifestyle, pollution and other factors, we all are exposed to more health-related issues than we were a few years/decades ago.

To sum up the above discussion, we can safely assume that no matter how strong our current source(s) of income can be, but these are no immune to various factors impacting them adversely.

Coming back to the picture with two tables, these tables are actually representing two individuals or organizations, first, one has only one source of income i.e. table with one leg and another one is with four sources of incomes i.e. table with four legs.

Now that we have seen one side of the coin i.e. problem, let's have a look at another side of the coin i.e. solution and trust me the solution is very simple and most of us follow/employ this knowingly or unknowingly. 

As the above picture suggests have multiple sources of income, so even if one source is impacted or dries up you have other sources to support you and your loved ones. 

"Don't put all your eggs in one basket".

In the next blog we will discuss what are the various options that we can look at to develop multiple sources of income, keeping in view the :

a) Times ahead

b) New Normal

c) Line of business having higher degrees of immunity

d) Goals and priorities 

Till then happy reading and be safe. 

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