Knowledge is better than money....

It is amazing to what extent we are willing to go to help a friend. ...
It was an older computer and by industry standards it wasn't worth fixing at $100 and hour.....to me, that is. My wife and I have been blessed with very good paying jobs. It has never crossed my mind, till today, that I have taken many things for granted over the past eight and a half years. To me $600 to fix a computer is a good down payment on a new hot rod computer. To others that $600 is a house or a car payment. I have a hard time asking for money from friends for doing jobs outside of work, but I love to fix things and I'm pretty good at it. I have everything I need right now; a home, cars, family and money....so why not help people when I can. Even if it means accepting pennies on the dollar.... even if it means sacrificing my own time to do so. Today was one of those times where I had other plans when a friend called, needing my help. Now my first response was to make up some excuse to get out of helping, but I accepted. After a long sigh, I gathered myself up take a look at their PC, hoping that it was just a minor fix and could be resolved quickly. Turns out it wasn't a minor fix and it took me six and a half hours to fix. A few years back I reached a point in my life where time, became more important to me than money. So for me to spend six and a half hours of a day off working on someone, elses problem bothers me...it bothers me a lot, considering how far I am behind on my own projects. So my first reaction, was to make them pay for my time. I could have easily charged a hundred dollars per hour or more for my services, which tends to be the going rate for tech services. After a long day of downloads and fighting a challenging computer virus, I was ready to collect my money and head home. That is, till I found a very good book in my friends home. After reading several pages I was unable to put the book down. It was a plethora of information, regarding a field I am passionate about learning. I decided right then and there to make them a deal: The book for my services. After making my proposal their was a long pause.......really, "that doesn't seem fair". "Six and half hour of work, for a forty-four dollar book". My response was, "knowledge is better than money". Knowledge allows us to get the good jobs, make more money, influence the right people and most of all, it gives us the ability to help people who may be less fortunate than ourselves....