Collection goals and strategies – do you have them?

[Jussi M.]

A picture tells a thousand words they say. Above pictured is Reinhold Messner, the legendary mountaineer par excellence. Mountaineering they say can become addictive. – What is then a mountaineer but an adrenaline fed collector of peaks who is trying to surpass his and in some occasions his fellow mountaineers previous achievements? What does this have to do with kerises?

That is a good and a valid question.

If we parallel mountaineering onto other collecting - even and specifically the collecting of kerises as we read this here in the Keris Warung Kopi - we can compare and contrast these two activities and see where our approaches either differ or not differ. It is the wise mountaineer who carefully plans ahead his attempts and follows a clear set of rules and laws that he has laid out before the task he is partaking. Why? - because it is in his best interest to do so in order for him to be able to actually land (pun intended) the goal he originally set to accomplish. Keys herein are:

- plan ahead
- rules & laws
- best interest
- reaching goals

For some of us collecting kerises is about actual collecting per se. For some the acquired pieces they have have other roles to fulfill. Despite the reasoning behind your interest, how well does your method of acquisition compare with that of the professional climber and the aforementioned keys?

Do you have clear goals? Do you have rules and laws that you actually do follow in your own interest? Are you actually moving towards these goals?

There are multiple reasons why people are interested in kerises and neither of them are any better or worse than others. I am not implying that lacking clear and concise goals, acquisition strategies and rules of engagement is in any way better than not having them. – Many like to live on the here and now and jump on the occasion when it does present itself; their collections thus becoming living entities that have a life of their own. – If one feels his interest in the keris bears fruit never mind in what form it is not anyone else's business to judge otherwise.

Yes, so? - what is my point then?

I wrote this because I am interested to hear if you alike me, are guessing whether you actually do follow the path you originally set to follow when you began traveling in the keris land? – And, if your answer is yes, is it so because you either never had a set path (goal(s)) to begin with, or, is it because you have lost track of what it was that you originally set to accomplish in the first place?

Thanks,

J.