(Jun. 24, 2023 ● Oslin Pierrette)
I’ve struck oil…but wait there’s more. There Will Be Blood speaks to that aspect of so many people wishing and feeling when they strike oil, that it means wealthy days to come. They’ve finally made it, and made it to the top of the hill. Where very very small few make it. It can be a grueling, painfully dark path to make it. With the price of blood, sweat, extreme obsessiveness, endless hours of relentless work, sacrificed family and loved ones. Years and years, and you finally struck oil.
But what most don’t understand, the end point, the dream, the goal, the end of the journey that people envision, is really just the beginning. That’s the dark reality. I worked my whole life for this very moment, for it not to even pay off as I dreamed or envisioned it would. You struck oil…now what? Where do you go from there? You’ve now encountered all the obstacles when you strike oil. What do we know about oil? We know that it’s one of the most lucrative resources for one to own, that has produced extremely massive wealth and fortune. But we don’t know how they turned oil into fortune. It takes entirely different industries to tap into the true value and worth of your oil. Unless it might as well be a useless vat of mud, sitting there. All that untapped proven potential, with nothing to do with it.
That was a lot of the journey of what There Will Be Blood was. The very few of the very few ever strike oil, and the very few of that very few gain the access and resources to do something with it. This is where people who know the industries take advantage of the people who don’t understand how industries work. They have the real access and resources to tap into the true value and worth of striking oil. They know how to transport it and utilize it. They have the true leverage. So you can either sit with your useless vat of oil, and let it spoil. Or you can just sell and get bought out by the industry guys, for a price they get to dictate with their leverage, knowing you can’t make anything of your oil. And that’s the game for so many. It’s a decent sellout, but nothing exponentially close to the true value of your asset.
Daniel Plainview had to go through and invest a lot more blood, sweat, extreme obsessiveness, endless hours of relentless work, sacrificed family and loved ones, complete loss of trust, grueling energy, and pain. That’s why it’s such a great title, “There Will Be Blood”. Such a great visceral title, to match a viscerally grueling film. Daniel had to become acquainted with the industry of pipeline transportation, to be able to transport and tap into the value of his assets. With his extreme determination and obsessiveness, the buyout was worthless to him, and he’s working towards the massive payout. It cost everything else in his world. It cost his heart, his soul, his lack of family, his care of anything else in the world, but he achieved it. He got to the top of the mountain. He got to the top of the pyramid. He’s no longer the few of the few, he’s the one on top of the pyramid, all alone, and that’s the cost of being at the top.
This is what many of the very few who essentially strike oil go through. Many people have accomplished things many will never. Developed the talents and skill on the level of the elite professional tier, that many people will never obtain. Create products that are sure fire hits. And it’s that feeling of, wow I finally did it, I made something of myself on an extremely rare elite level. Now to enjoy the fruits of my labor, like so many would believe…but wait, there’s more. How do you monetize your assets and creations, how do you tap into the massive wealth of your worth. Where do you go from there? You’ve now encountered all the obstacles when you gained extreme talents, value, or created a hit of a product. But most don’t know how they can turn their talents into fortune. It takes entirely different industries to tap into the true value and worth of your talent and assets. Unless it might as well be a useless set of talents and products, just sitting there wasting away. All that untapped proven potential, with nothing to do with it.
This is where people who know the industries take advantage of the people who don’t understand how industries work. They have the real access and resources to tap into the true value and worth of your talents and assets.They own or have access to the distribution companies to distribute your product. They have the marketing companies or teams, ad agencies to market your skills and talents to a larger scale. They own the resources to break your talent that would generate massive wealth from your value. So where now, where the journey actually begins, even though it took so much of your life to get to that point. It’s where you have to put your determination, obsessiveness, and insanity into overdrive, to put in the constant risk and work to achieve the massive payoff of your worth and value.
But in most instances that doesn’t happen. Most people in that position don’t have the knowledge, access, resources, or funds to be able to independently generate the wealth of their worth. So what ends up happening most of the time, are people relinquishing the rights to their work for a short price, that sometimes is decent, but isn’t true wealth. While the people with access to the industry get to tap into the majority of your true massive worth.
Then you have the very few of the very few who attempt to get the fruits of their labor, and be able to generate the true worth of their value. They try to independently tap into other industries to be able to tap into their true value. They’re going to have to invest a lot more blood, sweat, extreme obsessiveness, endless hours of relentless work, sacrificed family and loved ones, complete loss of trust, loss of sanity, grueling energy, and pain.
And many of those people don’t always end up in the best places. The absurdity of the industry destroyed them. I don’t know if there are any recent Daniel Plainview-like “success” stories. Where the person gets to make it on the top of the mountain on their own independent terms. For most, it doesn’t matter if you struck oil, most won’t ever get to have the true wealth of it, never going to obtain the true worth of their value.