False value is a cancer

False value distorts what we value individually, creating not only businesses but industries that don’t need to exist. Once created, these industries are hard to eradicate.

I took this photo of gum stuck in my shoe. There was something about it being a sticky situation and tough to extricate that felt appropriate for this post.

This is the second post in a series on false value. You can read the first post here.

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I had a Gameboy with a clear body tinted purplish-blue. I liked to play Donkey Kong Country. You needed to furiously press buttons in the right order to keep your character dancing in time. Think of it like an early predecessor to Guitar Hero.

At first, I didn’t get many points. By the time I stopped playing, I could achieve a perfect score on several rounds. I appreciated that with enough patience and practice, I could improve and move through the levels or up the leaderboard. 

I exchanged my time for the satisfaction of playing, improving, and ultimately winning. Perhaps not the greatest depth of value (hence I stopped playing), but value existed. 

Other exchanges offer no value, yet we make the exchange anyway. The thing is, when we make this exch…