Friends

It is a six hour difference in the Maui time Zone and Florida and that is why WFTD is not being sent at its normal time. I am on vacation, but am attempting to keep it going, so please bear with me.

When I was young I used to dream about being wealthy and I thought it would be the answer to all problems. Later in life after years of hard work, sacrifice, and risk-taking the Lord blessed me with some wealth. Soon enough I discovered that it is not all that it is cracked up to be. Don’t get me wrong I would rather be wealthy than not, but all is not bliss.

I suppose the worst thing about it is the human aspect. As much as I would like to believe that everyone with whom I am friends likes me because I am Bob, sadly if the money were to go away so would many of the so-called “friends”. I learned that first hand in the early eighties when I had nearly a million dollars embezzled from one of my companies and it nearly forced me into bankruptcy. When it all looked dim and bankruptcy seemed inevitable and I was barely holding it together, most of my purported friends scattered like rats when you turn on the lights in a deserted barn. It was sad.

Recently I told some friends in the Keys that I was listing my homes down there and would soon be leaving the Keys and moving fulltime to my plantation near Tallahassee. Many expressed sadness that we would be leaving. As anticipated a few who enjoyed some financial benefit from our being in the Keys were more grieved that the money was leaving than my wife or me. One couple has not even spoken to us one time since they heard the news. I look at it as no big loss and actually consider it a small gain by exposing the fact that all along their motivation to be friends was just about the money and not the friendship.

In talking with other people of means I have found that this phenomenon is not unique to me and is rather commonplace. Gold diggers that only hangout for what they can glean do have a negative effect on wealthy people whereby they are very wary of people and are reluctant to allow anyone to get too close. I try my best to look for the best in people, but I must admit to growing increasingly cynical.

I personally value friendship as TREASURE far more valuable than my bank account. I wish I had hundreds of them

A good friend recently wrote to me about a sermon that he heard the other day. He said, “Turns out that the average Facebook subscriber has approximately 167 friends (my daughter and most of her friends have over 800) a famous social psychologists says that a human is only capable of maintaining relationships with approximately 150 people and that only 2 of those people really care if we are alive or not.

Hmmm Perhaps this phenomenon is not just applicable to the wealthy. How many folks do you consider true friends? If you have many good friends who really care for you – for YOU – and not just for what you can do for them, then consider yourself very fortunate in fact exceedingly rich.

Proverbs 13:7
There is one who makes
himself rich, yet has nothing;
And one who makes himself
poor, yet has great riches.