David Erasmus

(I just found this post in my drafts from a year ago but seems fitting with recent posts, bit rambly so sorry about that but here it is……..)

Every day we have to make decisions about how to invest our lives and which commodities to use.

“Where your treasure is, your heart will be also”

If we are in the minority world that is privileged enough to look after our duties each day and still have spare resources we have to decide where to invest them.

Some invest mainly into their wardrobes, some into their bellies and some to the bettering of others lives.

But before we chose where to invest our surplus we have to choose which commodity is more valuable to keep in storage to give away.

As I see it there are 3 options

- Love Time

- Occupational Time

- Money

By love time I mean time spent with people to value them and invest purely in the relationship regardless of any wider impact or what you have to give or gain. Valuing people as Human BEINGS, For me this would be my family, my Godson, my housemates and close friends and others in my community that might need some love time.

By occupational time I mean contributing the thing that you are good at. For me this would be spending time doing stuff that is obviously work but I don’t get paid for it like looking through someones accounts, startup idea, speaking at a school or building something for someone Free of Charge, I call this putting value on Human DOINGS.

By Money I mean cold hard earned cash

I don’t know the answer to this and It is probably a silly idea in Hindsight to try to separate them out as they are not mutually exclusive, however I do know that the less functional of a reason that we maintain a relationship the deeper and purer it seems to be.

CONCLUSION : There is value in us as beings, there is also value in the ‘doing’ skills we have, and obvious value in the money we are stewarding.  The challenge it seems is in the balance.

RAMBLE OVER …….PHEW!

Since I was 18 I have been diligently making monthly video diaries and started filming them from my Mac when I was 21.

2 days ago I realised stupid ‘Time Machine’ just overrides the oldest stuff on your harddisk if it is full rather than alerting you that it is full!

NIGHTMARE! 3 years of music and diary lost!

It really threw me, I felt like I had a part of me stolen by technology (or more reasonably by my technological incompetence.)

Anyway, it got me thinking about living in the moment.

In the US a couple of weeks ago my dear friend and great photographer  Steve Booker was snapping away at the Grand Canyon and after about the 50th snap I just said “Steve; put the camera down mate, suck it up for a minute.” He looked at me, Smiled and agreed.

I don’t think we will look back and regret not taking the 50th photo but we may regret not quite taking as deep a breathe as we could have done……

When our children were singing their first song to us,

When the sky went all pink and orange and purple, in that unrealistic way it sometimes does,

When someone looked us in the eye and said that they loved us for the first time.

Or when are parents were in their final days of life.

People often ask me how I manage to juggle so many different things in my head and appear not to get stressed out and I always say the same which is that I try not to think about the past or the future when I am with people but attempt to give myself fully to the moment that I am with them.

This might sound a little Poncy or superspiritual to you but I think it is simple.

Do well with what is in front of you in this moment; to the best of your ability.

What is infront of you is often a person.

That person will always be better off if they get the WHOLE of you for that moment than if they get a distracted shell of you.

—— RAMBLE OVER SORRY ——

SUMMARY : Living fully in the moment, aiming to love for a few minutes at a time is the only safe way to live.

ACCOUNTABILITY: If I don’t act this way with you, please pull me up on it, I think its flipping important.

I am currently lucky enough to be road tripping around the USA in a school bus we bought off eBay with a bunch of my closest brothers. Experiencing the Good bad and Ugly the USA has to offer.

Currently I am in Muscle Beach, LA showing off my muscles…..Obviously not true,  I am just sitting in a coffee shop taking advantage of the glory that is bottomless coffee.

A couple days ago I sat outside our 173rd Fast Food restaurant with a Hitchhiker named Shaun that we picked up in Texas. We began to contemplate the world together and found  the conversation moved to a topic that I have noticed myself taking about with Americans on an almost daily basis…..Intimacy.

My experience is that the USA  are EXPERTS in entertainment and will keep you busy, eating, watching and spending until the cows come home!

It is my conviction though that the only thing that truly satisfies us is Intimacy.

To know and be known.

I believe the cost of entertainment as an overriding culture is that it is passive and does not require vulnerability. Without vulnerability I don’t believe we can gain true intimacy and without intimacy we have nothing.

Ironically though amidst the thick cloud of diversion and amusement in the American Culture probably the two most obvious influences on my position on this stuff are Americans, Brene Brown and Tony Campolo.

Brene above unpacks in a hilarious way the inconvenient truth that being vulnerable to pain needs to be at the centre of our life pursuits.

Tony Campolo has massively helped me put language to what I think is important in life direction through two simple words I listened to on his podcast “Across the Pond” ……..Intimacy and Action.

I decided 10 years a go to try my best to follow Jesus, I am not great at this and fail regularly.

Thankfully it is in his nature to forgive or else our relationship would be, well…buggered!

I believe Jesus calls us simply to live intimately in relationship with him, letting him into our shit and shine  and sharing intimately in love with those we live life with.

The second word Action I believe should comes from that place of Intimacy.

Intimacy without Action is indulgent as without it we are just a bunch of wet hippies chatting a bunch of hot air.

Much of the work I will do in my life will probably in hindsight be completely pointless however I believe if the action I take comes from a place of intimacy and is genuinely intended to create loving relationships and intimacy even if it flops hard then I think it will be enough.

Thoughts welcome this idea is still in progress……..

My mate Andy Smith once said, referring to the amount of Entrepreneurs from within my home friendship group…

“They must be putting something in the water in Leatherhead”

He was shocked as many are that most of my friends work for or run their own businesses or charities

To name a few of my closest friends from a sleepy village in Surrey :  Oliver Hall, Simon Kelly, Andy Lindsell, Louis Cole, Mike Moore, Andy Gill, Alex Ball, all starting and running their own AMAZING organisations and I could talk about 10 more!

Nearly none of us went to university or did amazing at school but we have built a culture together that is accepting and encouraging of people pursuing their dreams. It is a privilege to find myself amongst such a great bunch.

Are Entrepreneurs born or made?

Firstly Entrepreneur is a Horrific term! it sounds poncy, elitist and unattainable.

Secondly I want to separate Serial Entreprewatsits from guys and girls that have one project or business.

The risk profile for Serials is very high and there is definitely a unique DNA of person required to live that lifestyle.

For lifestyle startups however I believe EDUCATION AND EXPOSURE are the two key elements holding people back.

In my town where we have built that culture MOST people have opted for it.

In this climate of uncertainty and with GDP growth @ 0.2% we need people to step up, innovate, rather others around them and go for their dreams. Even if after a year it fails I am convinced that if presented correctly you would be MORE employable than if you had spent a year in corporate.

I currently sit on a board at UCL designing a new Degree which is fun, one of the big things I am pushing for is the idea that going into Startup is not LESSER of an option versus a corporate internship, if anything it can do more to develop a person.  My friend Raj Dey is doing great work in this space :  enternships.com

In Summary : I believe that being entrepreneurial can be for almost everyone but we don’t get the education and exposure to build our confidence that it is an achievable and valid life path!

Either that or they really do put some weird stuff in the Leatherhead water!

People always say to me “How come you get people to work free for you for 6 months?”

This obviously isn’t true but I have been fortunate enough to receive a lot of good will from those I meet and I have often thought about why this is….

I don’t promise the world in terms of financial reward or promotion but I do spend a lot of time getting those around me to understand the vision, the journey so far and help them see why their help would be valuable.

This AMAZING Video from RSA is the first thing I have seen that backs up what I have been seeing in practise.

If you don’t have time to watch it, it says, for people who have mentally challenging jobs bigger financial rewards DO NOT act as an incentive but rather, Autonomy, Mastery and Purpose are the reasons people get out of bed and work hard.

Dan Pink argues that Pay is a hygiene factor, that we need enough not to think about it but the above are real drivers.

I guess you would need to ask my guys and girls whether I have succeeded on this or not……