有感于电影——《浮生若梦》【转】

  不久前，有位读者建议我看看1938年由弗兰克·卡普拉拍摄的电影浮生若梦，这部电影是由莱昂内尔?巴里摩尔和吉米?史都华主演的。最近我才有机会坐下来欣赏，看完之后，我脑海中充斥着关于金钱以及我们为什么要极力追求金钱的思考。
电影的情节很简单。一个生意人爱上了他的秘书，并提议和她结婚。一桩生意涉及购买一座房产，但最后失败了，如若购买成功，这个街区都要重新进行规划。这座房产，当然是属于这位秘书的家庭。这个家庭根本不在意金钱，他们的主要精力在于维系友谊和享受生活。当女秘书把生意人的父母（卡比的家庭）介绍给自己的家庭（西克莫家庭）时，不可避免的文化冲突发生了，最终女秘书在两者之间做出了选择——她选择了友谊和单纯的家庭欢乐。
  也许有人会认为，一个金融博客的作者会羡慕卡比家。毕竟，他们是着意进行投资的人们，在意他们的事业，并且积累了非同小可的财富。难道这不是我们向往的吗？
  尽管如此，事实上我却更认同西克莫一家。他们远远算不上富有，但他们的生活中却不乏财政稳定性，他们只是不用为金钱考虑这么多而已。他们的物质所有并不充裕，但是他们彼此之间却无任何顾虑，深厚的友谊，开怀大笑的轻松，这才是真正的生活。
我想到了自己的生活。假使我集中于在如何赚取更多的钱，那么我的专业工作将会是另一个样子。我会集中精力把每篇文章写得尽量符合社会书签网站的口味，写出大量能够引起震动的文章，要么是远离我现在真正倚重的立场。我会把每一分钟的业余时间都用在回答媒体的提问上——我甚至可能会聘请一家公关公司为我工作来吸引更多的关注。
  我每天晚上还可以只是消磨时间。每晚在闲散中度过，只是和妻子玩农家乐游戏。每天下午都在庭院里和孩子们追逐嬉戏。每个周末回我的家乡去，我在那里没有收发电子邮件和别的什么麻烦。
  我会成为“成功人士”，但是我成功了吗？追求生活之外的东西，这不是成功。
  我想要的财务上的成功不是为了当个成功人士，我只是想保证我和家庭的生活，我还可以保持我的习惯和爱好，并且做自己想做的事情。我想要达到的财富高度不是要拥有一辆宾利，开上一辆丰田就可以。还有，我完全不用为明天担心，安心享受每一天，无需担心账单和工作责任或者是其他什么。
  我想要的财务上的成功不是卡比那样极度的富有。我追求的是西克莫家的简单生活，它不会受到外来伤害，我可以在其中感受到愉悦和安全。我要一所有大花园小房子，我不要大宅和劳斯莱斯。
  离开这个世界的时候，与其留给我的子孙们一大把金钱，倒不如留给他们一些对我的想念，和一个美好的人格。一边是你生命中的一部分，它可以代代相传给你爱的人。一边是你可以用来装修厨房的东西。

 

You Can’t Take It With You
A while back, a reader suggested that I watch the 1938 Frank Capra movie You Can’t Take It With You, featuring Lionel Barrymore and Jimmy Stewart. I recently had a chance to sit down and watch the film and it left my mind flooded with thoughts about money and why we really chase it.
The plot of the movie is very straightforward. A businessman falls in love with his secretary and proposes marriage to her. One of the business deals revolves around buying the final unpurchased house in a twelve block area which would allow that whole area to be developed in a different way. The house is, of course, owned by the secretary’s family. That family doesn’t care a whit about money and instead focuses their energies on friendships and enjoying themselves. When the secretary introduces the businessman’s parents (the Kirbys) to her family (the Sycamores), there’s an inevitable culture clash, and eventually the secretary has to choose between the two - and she chooses the friendships and simple pleasures of her family in the end.
One might expect that a personal finance blogger would admire the Kirbys. After all, they’re the ones who carefully invest their money, focus on their careers, and have accumulated serious wealth. Isn’t that what we want here?
In truth, though, I identified much more with the Sycamores. They were far from rich, but they had enough financial stability in their lives that they simply didn’t have to worry that much about money. They didn’t have all of the material trappings, but they had worry-free relationships with each other, deep friendships, the ability to freely laugh, and a full life.来源：www.examda.com
My own life brings this to bear. If my focus were on making as much money as possible, I’d be handling my professional life in a much different fashion. I’d focus on making every post as palatable as possible for social bookmarking sites, with lots of lists and articles that are intentionally written to shock or stand out instead of presenting ideas I really believe in. I’d spend every spare minute following up on every single media request - I’d probably even hire a PR firm to suck up some more attention.
I’d also be spending every evening honing things. Gone would be the lazy evenings playing Agricola with my wife. Gone would be the afternoons chasing my children around the yard. Gone would be the long weekends back in my hometown where I don’t even bother checking my email or anything else.
I’d be a “success,” but would I be successful? For what I want out of life, not really.
I want financial success not for the success, but for the fact that it secures my life with my family and my hobbies and interests and enables me to do work that I enjoy. I want to achieve some degree of wealth not so I can drive a Bentley, but so I can drive a Toyota and not worry at all about tomorrow and can just enjoy the day today without worrying about bills or work responsibilities or anything else.
The financial success I want isn’t the exorbitant riches of the Kirbys. It’s the simple life of the Sycamores, surrounded by the things that make me happy and secure in the knowledge that they’re safe from the world. Give me a quiet little country house with a big garden, not a mansion and a Rolls Royce.
At the end of my days, I’d rather leave my children and grandchildren with a slate of great memories and a great personal character than leave them with a fist full of money. One is a part of you for the rest of your life and is passed down over and over again to the people you love. The other one helps you remodel your kitchen.
You can’t take it with you, after all.