Everyone wants money, but what exactly do we know and understand money to be?
A medium of exchange, a store of value, a measure of wealth, a way out of poverty, the path to financial freedom. Or a thing of value
Money can mean different things to different people. However, money at its core is simply something of more significant value than mere paper.
Which do you value more – money or the value it possess?
The thing is, everyone, could be a millionaire if we all understand value and not the paper itself.
However, many of us today have little to zero idea of what exchanging one valuable good for another valuable service or item means. Or how that can influence our experience with money and with life on a larger scale.
Life is a matter of trade-offs, and money isn’t any different. You have to trade something in exchange for it and hope that the seller is willing to accept your offer. This limitation I believe birthed paper currency today and puts an end to trade by barter.
And because traders agree to accept paper money as a means of exchange – money evolves in the form of paper. If traders can’t accept the goods & services you are offering, they can part with cash and then use it to purchase something that’s of value to them.
Goods and Services
The system is designed to provide value to its users (the citizens). But then many of us aren’t even aware of this. The government today is merely a service provider and because of that service, we have to exchange something for the value-added services they provide to us.
You can see the effect of that through taxation.
Because the fact that I value Dollars over Naira means that money is not only about Naira and dollars or gold—which was previously stated to be recognized as a form of money.
Even that didn’t hold up to money standards because would the world's wealth depend on discovering new gold mines? I don’t think so.
I wondered what would anyone be able to come up with based on the idea of what money could be without going on the internet to scrap whatever scrap definition they cough out about money. This is why I’m not researching any points about this post and just allowing my critical thinking to be the judge.
Over my little time on this rocky earth, I’ve heard people say money doesn’t matter and some say money matters (sometimes the only thing that does matter).
But In my world, I say that value matters, and providing services for goods or products is the base of it all. You don't need some banker to tell you what money is. Neither can I define it for you.
Nevertheless, If you are like me who need money and don't know where to look, I will implore you to have something of value to trade for money and garner wealth or else you are fucked and may never be able to get to that level where you don't need to be a slave to money and that point where money doesn’t matter but only value does. Elon and Gates, plus other billionaires, understand this. They all have enough money, but they all crave to be valuable to humanity, even if they do so in a funny way.
Value-Added Money
If the Naira being used in my nation-state provides little to zero value to the citizens in exchange for their services, then the Naira might not be generally accepted by everyone due to how much value it carries. I accept Bitcoin tho and that because it’s valuable and easy to barter for another valuable good I desire without any limitation to where it can be used. This limitation I believe is why crypto is valuable compared to the US dollars because of the service it provides which is cutting across continents and geographical limitations.
Sellers across continents want to trade, but what they aim to use as a barter isn’t paper anymore but something digital without them having to meet you in person to make the trade.
We can see how value creeps into the picture. Sellers value Bitcoin over fiat, and that’s precisely why crypto is going to become a long-term medium for the exchange of goods and services. It’s also a store of value in the sense that everyone accepts it, so the need to hodl is higher than with fiat currency—which is being valued less all over the world due to too much inflation.
So I would like to hear your thoughts and ideas about money below, what does money mean to you? And how do you think money can be best understood in the world of finance today? I would like to hear your thoughts about them, or anything related to money and finance in general.
until next time
Image was created using canva