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Freedom is probably my favourite word. If there is anything that I want from life, it’s freedom. True freedom.

It’s interesting how we change during our lives. As a child we are completely free. We are happy to attempt anything, laugh and play and run and smile and whatever happens happens. Never thinking of the consequences, just acting in the moment.

As we begin to grow up though, we learn that there are consequences to our actions. While this is healthy – learning for ourselves that we can get hurt from jumping from something too high – we also learn a lot from our parents. We are told not to climb too high – “you will fall and hurt yourself, come down please”, told to slow down on our bike – “don’t go too fast, you will hurt yourself” and told not to eat too many lollies – “you will feel sick if you eat too many of those”. It’s not a negative thing – parents look out for the well-being of their children.

From the innocent advice given by our parents when we were young, we are then bombarded with why not to do things. Fear on TV, fear in the paper, fear everywhere. If we aren’t given the advice directly by the TV, our parents are. Stay in line and everything will be ok, you will be safe, but be different, and who knows what will happen!

Most people, myself included to an extent, grow up into people that just conform and do the same as everyone else. We no longer laugh and run around and jump and do whatever we choose. We know that if we laugh at the wrong thing people can be offended. We know if we run around and jump up and down we will look like an idiot, so we take the safe option.

We all call it “growing up” and “being sensible”, but from my experience most people hate the constraints in which they live… They crave the freedom that they had as a child, it just takes a long time to realise this.

It seems almost a textbook lifestyle cycle for the Baby Boomers – my parents’ generation. They were born, free spirited fun loving children, then “grew up” and did the “sensible” thing and bought houses, had families and so on. Now as the kids are moving out, they are wanting their freedom back. Some may be rich enough to buy a holiday house, some travel around the world by plane or on a cruise ship, while others buy a caravan and drive around, stopping wherever they please. It’s becoming less and less common for them to just grow old in their house nowadays.

It’s been something that I have been aware of for a few years now, but only now am I piecing it all together. Humans are creatures that are born in nature. We need our freedom to be sane. Early this year my fiancee and I made the decision to lead a life of change. We will still buy a house. We will still “be sensible”, but we will force ourselves to retain some level of freedom in our life. By “mixing it up” we hope to lead an exciting life, with plenty of choice and an easy going lifestyle. We don’t need a lot, but we need our freedom.

It’s amazing how things have changed. In the last 50 years, Australians have gone from a population of early school leavers, to pushing a large number of year 12 graduates into tertiary education.

While there is clearly a place for these organisations, I think it is unfair to be encouraging those who aren’t academics to continue studying after they finish up at school.

Take myself for instance. I went to a good private school in Adelaide, and from year 9 onwards I was asked “what uni degree will you do?”. Not “do you want to study after year 12?” or “have you thought of getting a trade?”. Nope, always about the uni. In the end, after being encouraged by my teachers, my parents and my mates to go to uni, I enrolled and gained entry into a Software Engineering degree. Two months in, I realised that it just wasn’t for me. I’m not able to learn by having someone tell me something to my face, I need to do it myself, and the course content was not for me. I saw out that semester, and nothing changed, so I quit and started working full-time.

It was always my dream to work in IT, and I was always told that in order for that to happen I’d need a degree, but it’s just blatant misinformation. Now that I’m out in the real world I realise how many people who work in my industry don’t have a degree. Many of them have certifications from companies like Microsoft, Cisco, Novell and so on, but very few have a degree – and most that do have a degree have one in Business Management or something completely unrelated like that.

Now I’m not disputing that degrees are important. There are many jobs that require a large amount of study to do it well, and rightly so. My friend is a dentist, my fiancee is an teacher and one of my other mates is now a lawyer. It just annoys me when I see teenagers convinced that they should go to uni so they can finish an obscure degree that won’t help them at all.

Why encourage your child to start their adult life with even more study after spending the last 13 years in the books, and a $20,000 debt before they truly know what they want to do with their life? If they have 100% direction and know that they want to be a doctor, then great. But if they “think” they want to be a personal trainer, there’s no point pushing them into a Science degree only for them to quit after doing it for two and a half years.

Honestly, whatever happened to learning the job that you need to do, on the job? Are employers too cheap to train people nowadays?

It’s obvious that universities want (and probably need) more and more money, so they offer more and more courses and degrees to do this. Because of the wider range of degrees, more people are going to uni to study, and because more people are considering study, more of the image driven parents are encouraging (and often forcing) their kids to study “with their best interest at heart”.

Everybody has their own direction and everybody learns differently. Be true to yourself and follow your own path.

I’m lucky enough to have been sent to Queensland this week for work. I am here to attend a training/conference/expo of sorts called Microsoft Tech.ed.

Upon arrival to the conference I was given a HP netbook – a HP Mini 2140 to be precise. I’m a massive geek and I love this thing (I’m typing this blog entry on it right now).

I just can’t believe how image driven Queensland is. I know everyone, everywhere is somewhat driven by image, but never before have I seen people so driven by image that their lives evolve around it. Talking to Queenslanders, watching them walk around on the streets, seeing the numerous mini trucks, heavily modified v8′s and turbo cars everywhere, not to mention people riding choppers, etc, etc – it’s just a state driven by looking good – at any cost! They are all trying to keep up with eachother, even though only few of them can afford to.

Obviously this sort of thing happens everywhere – certainly in Adelaide where I live, but just not on this scale.

While I’ve been here I’ve also had some time to catch up with my sister who lives in Queensland too. It’s been great to catch up with her, and finally meet my niece – who is just awesome.

Spending time with my sister and her family has once again reinforced my opinion that “things” and ”stuff” is just so unnecessary. I completely understand that people need their hobbies, they need their few luxuries, but at what cost?

This isn’t a dig at the state at all – it’s beautiful up here… In areas anyway. I’ve considered the idea of moving up here a fair few times now (although never seriously enough to talk with my fiancee about it). I just don’t know if I could keep up with everyone else. I really think that to survive in Queensland you need to be very career drive, have very well of parents, or be happy to live a life of eternal debt.

With the Global Financial Crisis perceived to be behind us, people are out and about in Australia spending up big like it never really happened here. I suppose it didn’t for a lot of people.

I try to keep an eye on news articles, and forum posts on the Aussie dollar and inflation figures. While I’m certainly not an expert, I’m slowly beginning to understand how things work in this world of ours.

Money is important to everyone during these times. It puts food on our table and clothes on our back. It’s most people’s primary concern, and as a result they want more of it.

My mum was talking to me the other day about her superannuation, telling me how she needed more in there so she can retire comfortably. Already in Australia, super funds have taken huge hits in their returns. Over the last few years people have lost more money than they have made in their super fund, yet we are still all told that we should invest all of our money into super for retirement.

Following the Real Estate Bubble in Australia and the opinions of those who know their economics, it’s very plausible that our country will suffer high levels of inflation in the future. All to support a housing bubble.

So we are all banking on being rich. People invest for the future, so they have more money. Shares, property, super and so on. It’s all so we have more money, later.

The question I ask everyone is, “what is the value of a dollar?”

What’s it worth to you? What will it be worth in 20 years time? Are you banking on being rich?

I tell my mum to plan for the future. In my opinion, she should be planning to have everything she needs before she retires (within reason of course). Planning to have the money to do it later is a dangerous idea. If inflation hits, and the car that once cost $25,000 now costs $100,000, she’s stuffed!

I keep telling my friends who are rushing into the idea of buying a house to take their time and get to it when they are ready. No one will listen because of the free money on the table from the government, and the fact that they want to get in “before the next boom”. They aren’t necessarily making money from a boom. They are making “more dollars”, but not actually becoming wealthier in the long run. While their house is “worth” more and if they sell they will have “more dollars”, everything they will want to buy with those extra dollars will be more expensive. Essentially, they are perceived to be richer, yet everything is more expensive. They are back at square one. Essentially, if their money is making 5% interest, and inflation is 5%, they aren’t making anything. The numbers are just changing.

True financial planning, true investing is beating this situation. You need to make more money than inflation is absorbing.

It’s amazing how common sense this is for most people, yet how completely confused some people are by this information. To some, a dollar is worth a dollar, nothing more.