Did you know that you have access to resources that increase the more you spend them and use them?


This feels counter-intuitive.


If you spend money, you will have less money.

If you eat food, and you will have less food.

If you use an eraser, you will have less eraser.


Most things decrease when we use them or spend them.


We rarely think of the resources that you and I have that increase the more we spend and use them.


Think of exercising.

If you spend energy going for a half-hour run once a day, you will have more energy throughout your day-to-day life than if you don’t go for those runs.

Spending physical energy results in you having more physical energy.


Skills are similar.

If you use a skill (even a new one that is just starting to sprout 🌱), you will end up with more of that skill.

Use some skill to cook a meal, and you’ll gain more skill in cooking.

Use some skill to 3D print something, and you’ll end up with more skill in 3D printing.

Write, and your ability to write will increase.

The more of it you use, the more if it you will have.


When I was a kid, there was a song we would often sing in Sunday School:

🎼Love is something, if you give it away 🎶
🎶You’ll end up having more. 🎵

It’s true. The more you Love well, the more Love you will have.


We all have access to these and many more innate regenerative resources — Gifts we’ve been given that, as we use and express them, we will naturally gain more and more of.

That’s worth stewarding well!

These are things that can’t be taxed. They can’t be stolen. And we can only lose them when we don’t use them and spend them well.


When my wife and I were talking about this idea, she also pointed out that innate degenerative resources are also a very common and present reality in the human experience:

  • Use violence, and it will result in more violence.
  • Getting into credit card debt is likely to result in more and more debt.
  • Hate will always breed more hate.


The take-away seems fairly self evident, then:

Use and spend your innate regenerative resources as much as you can!
And avoid the degenerative at all costs.