FINANCIAL WISDOM IS PROFITABLE TO DIRECT

SLEEP-WAKE ZONE DISTURBED 

This morning, I was on my bed musing on how to get about writing. I was planning on three posts which I intended to write and post today but since I am already on this one, one of those posts will have to find a space tomorrow; one or two, I think. 😂  

Well, here I was musing on the difficulty of writing today; my laptop battery is bad and I have not had electricity in my community for about two years; give or take, when my little brother, the fashion designer and all round hustler, came to the bed we both share and we got talking. 

You know that stage of sleep when it feels like you are in between worlds; like your mind is still clinging to the faint scents of your dream, while your body has arrived earth? Well I was in that zone, when he came. 😣

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I laid under the duvet and tried to follow his train of thought, while he prepared for church. In this manner, we had a discussion on living above one’s means.

A STORY THAT ILLUSTRATES 

He gave me an illustration that I think truly reflects this condition and I will share it with you.  

A young man whom he claims is quite gifted at building beautiful clothes has this problem of living above his . The young man, still a journey man under a master, receives between the range of two thousand naira to three thousand naira every week from the aforementioned master. He lives with the master, so he has free lodging and food. Yet the young man has no savings. He spends his money on expensive clothes and foot wears. He has not given any thought to his life after his training ends and he is free to run his own shop.

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 My brother, bending down to buckle his sandals said what kills him the most s the boy’s attitude towards those who are making plans for their future; he considers them to be weak, to be naïve and boring. 🤔

There are so many of us who live like this young man. Even I have fallen into this category several times in my working life. I have worked for a year with not even a toothbrush to show for my sweat. We think that the money will keep coming in, we believe that tomorrow will take care of itself. I know that tomorrow is as uncertain as the currency market. I know that tomorrow tends to shock the unprepared. I know that preparation, even when we do not know what we are preparing for, is a key to success. Mark that I say a key, not the key. There are other keys to success but they do not connect this discourse.

 

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Why do people live above their means? Why do you buy a car when you are squatting with your friend in a one room apartment in Kubwa? We know of people who own flashy clothes and jewelry as well as drive the latest models of expensive cars. We know those who own the latest models of expensive cell phones but they have no savings, no income stream, no investments, no job, nothing! They are living on fumes but we envy them. We see them and want to be like them. We want to go to the club and break caskets of expensive liquors like they do. We want to have everything they seem to enjoy and more but we do not know it is just smoke and mirrors. It is a magic trick. 

WHAT CAN I SAY 

Today is the start of a new week. It is the second Sunday of a new year. We made a lot of mistakes in the past year that should not be repeated this year. One of them is living above our means. 

Be content with what you have achieved. Make do with what you have and plan with it. The moment you start taking your financial education and life serious, you will never find your bank balance in the red. 

Friends, we have great writers, artists, craftsmen and women, computer geniuses, thinkers, and more here on Steemit. We are making a living from the words that spill from our brains, we are having fun as steem dollars and Steem price rise in cryptocurrency exchanges all over. We are making money but are we living within our means? Are we planning our expenses and investing? Are we using our financial literacy to protect ourselves from tomorrow’s capriciousness? 

SOME POINTS TO NOTE 

To save us from falling into the traps that other persons have falling into time and time again, here are some points I would like us to note and keep close to our hearts

1. Having money is not a sign of success. Success is how you manage the money and the sort of person you become when you have money. 

2. Invest in knowledge. Steemit is but a small part of a large whole. There are so many aspects of the Steem blockchain that is still a mystery to many of us, including me. Read up, gather knowledge and some of this knowledge may just save your financial life. 

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3. Make lasting friendships not for upvotes or comments. Make true and lasting relationships because at the end of the day, true riches depend on the relationships you have kept. You are stronger with true friends than with money. 

4. Do not compete with anyone. Everybody travels his or her own path. Because Mr A bought a car with his earnings from teemit and posts the pictures on his blog, does not mean that you too should get a car. You have school fees, medical bills, rent, parent’s upkeep, etc to handle. Focus on you and package your spending. The car will come and when it does, you will drive it without a heart tremor.🤒

5. Save at least ten percent of your earnings. I cannot emphasize this enough. The Richest Man in Babylon is one of my favourite books on personal finance. I take the book wherever I go. I have read that book so many times, I lost count. You should get it and give yourself knowledge for your own sake. Save in SBD if you do not trust fiat currency; save in landed properties, in gold, oil, in other cryptocurrency, in a small safe at home, in bonds and secure securities; save! Tomorrow is like a child playing with a toy.🤑

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6. Buy what you need not what you want. I want a new laptop but I am still using my old Samsung mini with bad keys and weak battery power. I could get the laptop and say to myself that I am on Steemit; I will make the money again. That is a good plan and it would work but I needed a phone much more than I wanted the laptop. My old phone had battery problems, screen problems and the camera pixel is low. So I got me a new phone and the pictures and data from the phone will get me the money with which I will buy my new laptop. 🙏

CONCLUSION

What I am saying in essence is that financial planning is not only for those who do the regular nine to five jobs. It is also necessary for us whose job or business has no security. Question: if you open the steemit website tomorrow and find that it has shut down, where will you be, financially? Chew on that.😱

Well my brother has gone to church, I am at home in my boxer shorts, sitting on my bed, my back resting on my pillow, the sound of music from a church nearby filtering in through my room window, as I write this. It is a lovely Sunday morning filled with possibilities; use it wisely. 

Thanks for stopping by;

Peace

Original content by @warpedpoetic.