For the Best Influence on Future, Invest with Caution

As far as present is concerned, neither you can go into the past nor go into future for doing something either to wipe off influences of the past or to make a better future. Thus, what happened in the past has to be accepted and whatever would happen in the future, you need to wait for seeing or acting. What you can do is in the present only with carried over effects of the past, and to influence the future. Therefore, just be in the present and do your best to take care of the past as well as of the future.

We all wish to have the best influence of our actions today in all fields of endeavor whether it is health and lifespan, prosperity and progress, pleasures and happiness, far and wide relationships, etc. How to achieve it we don't know probably because there is nothing to ensure an influence in the future, directly. This doesn't however mean that we just ignore our wish accepting our inability of controlling the future. There is an indirect way of influencing the future even with being in the present.

An action at a time has its reaction instantly. This reaction has a visibly maxima at the moment and goes on fading as time passes. Influence of an action, however, may have a pattern different from the reaction. For example, a financial investment in a project today has peak effects on our financial position and reactions of the market forces instantly, but its influences may peak at some time in the future. This makes a reaction different from an influence of a phenomenon. We surely bother about the reaction for its effect on the present but we are highly concerned about the influence. Even our focus of the action is at the influence, which is always in the future. Thus, we influence our future with our actions today. Still, we can't directly ensure a desired influence in the future. We need to go an indirect way.

A phenomenon about our present action which we control today is intensity of the action produced through pumping our best resources into the action. These resources may be our wisdom and intellect, monetary resources, our will power, or even a public support, etc, or even a combination of such resources. This is the only thing we can do today to derive the best influence into our future. In Business Management terms, present actions are said to be investments for the sake of a better future. All investments need cautious decisions and approaches like where to invest, what to invest, how much to invest, etc

What to Invest?

We can invest only a resource what we own today like money and wealth, wisdom and intellect, education and scholarship, name and fame, personality features, smartness and decisiveness, skills and professionalism, contacts and relationships, etc  These resources are of two types - one for which our ownership decreases after investment, and the other for which our possession increases after investment. While ownership of money and wealth decreases after an investment, all other resources listed above tend to increase after an investment.

Common with all the investments of resources of the second type is the investment of time availability of which decreases with the investment. Therefore, two types of resources may be simply said to be money or time. A better strategy is to invest your time to build your future.   

How Much to Invest?

Every investment involves some risk or arising of a contingent situation, expecting you to invest more or lose what you have already invested. For successful dealing with such a situation, you must have something in reserve. In case of investment of time, you must have some free moments which may be invested in case of an emergency requirement.

Another aspect of keeping away some time reserve from investing is that every investment aims at building the future only, while the investor requires to live in the present too. So, keep your present intact even with investing for the future. Every investment must be limited to resources which are surplus from the present.

A third aspect is that an individual can't afford to be an investor only. He is required to attend other matters of life like entertainment and recreation, family and relationships, assessment of situation, etc apart from attending to his/her duties as an investor of time. After all, the whole purpose of human life is living life in its wholesomeness.   

Where to Invest?

The last question to be decided about an investment is where to invest. Every investment for a better future tends to go beyond control of the investor in yielding results. This means that an investment involves some degree of exploitation of the investor by other forces making direct use of the investment. What an investor can do is to keep the exploitation to a minimum level through choosing a field of investment where he/she too has some control. Leaving oneself fully on others' discretion is no wisdom.