Same, though honestly with my bad memory, I’m not sure I’d do all that much better with the red pill. Itd be hard for me to put together enough seed money to make a decent return, and I don’t remember specific dates well enough that I think I could convince my parents about it.
I bet there’s a distinct age group for each one. Older, established, family, doing ok? Take the 10 mil. Don’t want to give up your family and all that. Might be pretty hard for people to give up. 10 mil would be an easy, instant retirement. You can enjoy your remaining years.
Sure, there are going to be some pretty unhappy outliers for whatever reasons, unable to reach a stable relationship, multiple failed relationships, poor financial situation, etc. that would hit the reset button.
Younger folks? Maybe yeah…hit that reboot. Start off with a lot of great knowledge, big nest egg to get a huge leg up on everything, you’ll retire at 40. Many more millions or even a billion with all the knowledge you have. Life would have a good shot at being great.
I thought red at first, and if it were only slightly different parameters I’d still choose it, but 6? That’s too far back to be trapped in a child’s body and environment. At least going back to a more plausible age for a grown up’s mindset like teenage years would be a bit easier to deal with and to lay low, it’d be strange how much more mature and less reckless and slightly boring of a teenager you had suddenly become, but at least it wouldn’t be like international news. At 6, life is going to drastically changed by your seemingly impossible linguistic skills alone, child development experts would want to study you, you’d now be a prodigy, not necessarily a bad thing but unless that specifically was the path you’d always wanted but never achieved, you’d now be pretty well set down that road and all that comes with it. The relationship with your parents would be so different and they’d be robbed of your childhood and suddenly have this adult they’d never met before to deal with after barely getting any time to get to know their own child. It’d be so frustrating too, no one would let you drive and you couldn’t drink, or fuck. You’d hopefully be able to get yourself some more autonomy than your average 6 year old if you revealed all your cards right away because it’d become immediately clear that fisher price toys and curfews and first grade weren’t appropriate for you, but even so your adulthood, already well underway by this point would be drastically curtailed for something going on a decade. Maybe you’d decide to play like in a movie and adopt secrecy so your parents and peers don’t know how smart you are, but that’d frankly be way worse and so exhausting and lonely and alienating.
If this was, maybe start again at 14, or better yet 16, I’d take that red pill no problem. It’s most of the benefits of the blank slate try again with benefit of hindsight premise, but skipping over the parts that would be simply intolerable for an adult. At 16 you’re a ‘young adult’ getting to relive some of the things you miss about being a child but with many of the benefits of being an adult and biologically you’re pretty much over the worst of it, if you really hate the social restrictions imposed upon you by being not technically an ‘adult’ you’re only 2 years away from fixing that, not over a decade, and when you get there you’ll be in way better control of the trajectory of adulthood. Most of the really decisive things about adulthood that trace back to childhood happen around this time as well so it’s where you’d get the most bang for your buck. You can take a very meandering path up until that point and still change direction but this is where decisions start to become more binding and long lasting so it’s really the point where most people, if you asked them, would probably begin making tweaks if they could. I reckon the details about one’s current life that most people want changed wouldn’t have any meaningful correlation to things they did when they were 6, it’d be things like their career, or relationships they’ve had or wish they’d had, it’d be academic ability or a better body not ravaged by years bad lifestyle choices pretty much all of that is something you could very impactfully change at 16 without the need to learn to read all over again.
Ever saw a child or teenager trying to act like an adult? Well now try that the other way around. Since you are a smart adult, you might get it done for a day. But for 12 years? You will slip and it will be noticed.
To add insult to injury, after you become grown up, that whole prodigy thing will fall apart, because you weren’t actually all that much smarter than everyone else. You were just X years ahead for a child and that bonus melted with the years. So then you wouldnt be a prodigy, you’d be a failed prodigy and that is if the whole ordeal doesn’t drive you insane in the meantime and you get hospitalized and drugged up for good.
Finally, even if you manage all of that to then buy bitcoins in the day. “Mommy mommy, please let us put 1.000 € in Internet coins that are 50 cents today. They will become worth 50.000 a piece i know it i promise, Mommy please!”. How do you think your mother will react?
Very comprehensible considerations! I’d love to study another field, just expanding my expertise and having a good time with fewer responsibilities than I have today. But giving up my family? No way! Blue pill it is.
I feel like at 6 you’re not going to be tripped up by teenage relationships like you would landing in a hormone flooded/different brain state in your most important social years
It sounds like a plan for having no friends from school
Assuming that the red pill lets me revert to a 6YO (thus preserving my knowledge), and not time traveling back to when I was 6, I might be tempted to do a lot of unethical stuff to make a ton of money, provide for my family, convert the remaining assets to BTC, memorize the wallet details, then take the red pill. As a 6YO, the government can’t hold me responsible for my adult conduct.
If it’s a time travel situation, there’s no contest. Red pill after studying the history of inventions. Start out by inventing the Pet Rock (near zero initial investment), reinvest in the fidget spinner, Pokemon, D&D, and writing the scripts to all the blockbuster movies. Provide technical details to the right industries for a royalty. Invest heavily in the creation of the Internet, then start Facebook, Google, and Amazon, bypass the PC and jump straight to smartphones. I’d be the patent king of the world.
With the trillions of dollars, I’d heavily influence politics. I’d fully fund the campaigns of moderates, institute free Internet-based accredited college, set up work training programs to support industries I intentionally locate in depressed areas, and make most of my business non-profit. And maybe, just maybe, avoid the cesspool we have today.
Yes, you could memorize an almanac ala “Back to the Future”. But sporting event outcomes are often dictated by random events that may or may not happen. Your best bet is to build on your own efforts based on generalized trends.
The one thing is would you end up with your soul mate again and even if you did it wouldn’t be the same relationship you had back then. I thought about this and have 3 kids and don’t know if I would want to give up on my kids because there’s no way I could say goodbye to my kids and never see them again.
Having financial plans in place is very important, I know it’s hard but making a savings account will help a lot. Even if you just set it up so that $20 a week goes to it it will help.
Most Americans can’t afford a $500 emergency so your first goal will be getting to that point in a savings account. Your second goal will be getting to that point plus having funds in your account for you deductibles for your insurances (car, health, renters, etc). Then your out of pocket max for health.
It’s a slow roll building a savings account and it’s hard to leave it alone but it will help a lot.
Of course even then it’s still pretty nerve wracking so one thing that I’ve done is get a line of credit with my credit union and some credit cards with really high limits that I pay off every month and only use for like gas or groceries. That way they stay open and in the event of a financial emergency that surpasses my savings I’m not completely fucked. Which saved my ass 2 years ago when I had to have emergency dental surgery 3 times in one year. ($10k that I’m still paying off)
Basically trying not to over extend yourself financially will help immensely.
But a massive help is having a healthy social safety net.
Thank you for writing that. I felt like credit card taught me to be a little irresponsible with cash (even though I payed for everything from debit straight away - I thought this two-step payment would better my score and limit for the future, lol), so I blocked it, but from that angle it really makes sense to have one in case of emergencies.
Paying for three dentals in a row can be only topped by the constant dental pain itself. If you budget didn’t crumble under that weight, with your situation, you are a tugboat called Unsinkable (or even Unthinkable?). I’m not joking, I can’t imagine it now, even though I’m housed and have some people I can loan from. It’s just too much.
Why’s that much discipline and intellect is needed to stay alive while poor? Stereotypes paints poor people as lazy and stupid. Is there a special program I can apply to and stop caring at all? Doubt so ):
That was actually my point, you don’t go for money because you want money. You go for money because you want things money can get you, house, car, safety, status, etc (different for everyone). In this case money can’t even get you what you really want, so it’s a useless tool.
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