It’s is ironic how we are inclined to comfort, we
normally want things the easy way and technology has done a great deal to bring
comfort to people. While listening to a gentleman talk at a recent event, he
mentioned something that gripped my heart and has stuck, he called it the rule
of life and I thought I could share a few personal insights from this quote.
“Do the easy and comfortable and life will be difficult, do the difficult and uncomfortable and life will be easier”
When it comes to matters of personal finance,
sometimes we will be excused for being young and naive because in most instances
we either weren’t taught or we just put good advice away by saying "I will do this when I am earning this much" or "I will do this when I grow" etc. When we are young (age, physically, emotionally), we
are bound to make a lot of mistakes like buying out of impulse, desiring to
have the latest trends of things which in simple terms just enslave us. However, I want to bring hope and light to those who are reading this piece to encourage
them that they can start all over to avoid making mistakes that many have made.
Life is About Sacrifices
Life is about sacrifices. I am encouraged by my
mother who sacrificed a lot of things to make sure we had a good education.
There are times she would say, “I am not having new clothes all the time, just
because I want you to study.” These words touched me so deeply and there is a life lesson I learned and that is, the day you get children, you stop
living and working for yourself but so much you do is for and about them. God bless my
mother.
Working
and Earning
When I started working and earning, there was
pressure by my peers or just the corporate class to go chill out, hang out and
just spend spend spend spend… and spend but I was already a grounded guy and
knew what to do with money, however, this doesn’t mean I haven’t had my fair
share of mistakes, and to me, they are learning points, Still, I have seen this
evil under my eyes where a young corporate lady or guy will tell you that, I
can’t save because I earn little, however, they are the same people hanging out
every Friday or over the weekend and to make it worse they even borrow to
sustain such a lifestyle, they do nothing to increase their money but do
everything to spend it – how foolish. It is sad and we still see such things
happen.
From my savings, the first mistake I made was to buy
a car. I had two options in my mind and the other was to buy land. I did not buy
the land and as much as I was happy with the car, I look back and regret that
decision. I chose comfort at the expense of investing, who knows what that land
would have done for me or my family, I was short-sighted and I encourage any
out there to look beyond your comfort while making decisions, look at the bigger
picture.
When we choose to do the difficult and uncomfortable
things now, for example, saving for a rainy day, saving to invest or start a
business and delaying gratification, or avoid to spend to impress someone who
doesn’t have an ounce of care towards us or just trying to keep up with the
status quo, it puts us in a place where we have control of certain things in
our lives.
There so many difficult decisions in life that have
to be taken, and such decisions aren’t based on how strong or how weak we are, they
are based on the fact that we can see the end result or see the end from the
beginning – that’s being visionary. Life is quite predictable and on a personal
note, I think it stems down to the decisions we make in life keeping all other
factors constant.
Decide
Today
Decide today to live purposefully, to plan, have a
vision, have a goal, decide to save and decide to invest; when you make such
tough decisions now.
- You will be required to do away with certain things that you have been so hooked to.
- You will have to put some friends away and get those who are willing to make you grow.
- You will have to take the high road even if you are alone, along the way, you will find those who believe in your dream.
- You will have to start living on purpose and not out of pressure to appease a few.
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