Financial Responsibility & Economic Frugality; Why Do A Lot Of People Synonymise Them?
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A lot of people equate a spiritual phenomenon to money, they say that money comes and leaves and that any of their decisions and choices never matters, especially if the universe works against them. I grew up in a society where people maximize the pleasure that money brings, they believe that you need to "spend" in other to "own", note; they didn't say you need to "invest" to own,
they said: you need to 'spend" to "own". These are people without real-time investments, they do not have back-ups, especially if there was an emergency in their life. They have the opinion that they need to live one day at a time. Dependent on the next day for the expenditures of that same day.
Inasmuch as a lot of people might argue that life shouldn't be all about frugality, I tend to believe that what a lot of people deem as being frugal is when you're making plans for every cent you have, making up a scale of preferences of which some unnecessary wants will end up becoming opportunity costs to what truly matters at the end of the day.
I believe that the way we earn our living, finances or means often determines how responsible we are when it comes to spending, while this isn't always true, it's seldom true. I've seen patterns, and i'm someone who learns from failure stories even more than I do from success stories. This is because, to be overly responsible with money, lessons from failure are often the best teachers.
I try to want to allow myself to influence my decisions rather than allow external forces. Taking note of "thin lines" and boundaries. Some people do not have control over their spending habits, and this is because of how they overly allow themselves to be influenced by externalities. For someone who isn't rich, being overly exposed to scarcity in a cost-push Inflated economy, no one would tell me otherwise.
Needless to say, a lot of people from states with more stable economy might tend to disagree with me, but then the things I consider when spending is cost of commodity, my finances, the environment and the economy of that particular state, some of these things are like variables that influences your decision-making.
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While I might not be able to talk about the lives of wealthy people, I believe I need to be there in other to talk about it. But being someone on lives in arguably the worst place in the world economically, I believe I can still talk about scarcity and how to manage little resources to someone that probably lives in a state like the one I come from, and it will feel relatable to them.
This is to say that I picture myself as running into a brick well and having nothing at the end. The fear of having nothing is what births accountability and planning. Frugality isn't overly too good, sometimes I forget my finances and spend on my cravings so much that it breaks a pattern, although i don't get carried away, i try to stay in line, no matter how excessive I get and this is the height of economic discipline
Back to the first paragraph, I don't believe you need to spend to "own", unless you're investing, as it's a belief held by many people i know in my society. This is totally gross, secondly there is no spirituality affinity with money. Whatever money is, is what we deem of it. People try to make excuses for their irresponsible ostentatiousness, but then this even plunges them more into anxiety, they lose money and never hold themselves in account.
Whenever i lose money, I try to take responsibility as it's solely my choice. This helps me to do better. It hardly matters how much. What we deem as too little or too much might not be what we make of it. That's why being responsible is all that matters, remember, being financially responsible isn't being frugal.
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My name is @Josediccus, a young Nigerian student who is a Vlogger, A Psychologist, Poet And Sports Writer/Analyst. I'm using my contents as a process to create shared meaning as well as create expressions through which people on/off hive can relate. I believe content is a process to be enjoyed and relished and I'm up for any collaborations in my field stated above. Cheers
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I also think failures tend to teach you more than successes. When we do, we try to figure what went wrong and that is why I tend to remember far more about the annoyances of a program than the benefits they tend to give you sometimes. You would think people would learn from the financial hardship of living paycheck to paycheck but they don't.
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Truth is, people are different when they're in a new finacial standing and this makes it difficult for them to see learn. Its different with me, I tend to learn with my loses and this has even motivated me more than anything in life.
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Whenever l look back at my school days including my just concluded NYSC days, I always feel grateful for the experiences l had because it is shaping my thoughts and making me a better version of me.
What l like about myself is that l overlook any general mindset and way of life that is not in line with what l plan to achieve. You can never see me going on a spending spree without being calculative about it. It doesn't have to be done on paper. My mind just works out stuffs on its own.
So, spending to impress is not my thing. I've been without cash with no hope of getting any so, l know how it feels and l'm securing a future for myself in a way that l will never be forced by condition to hold onto a thin financial lifeline.
By the end of the day, those that just spend because they expect it to be magically replenished would end up with an empty Wallet. Loll... I don't want to be that person
A lot of us that were institutionalized in Nigeria would always relate, when we look at the society we'd see that pressure to spend above our means because we can be sucked in, but then I don't owe it to anyone to live ostentatiously and this is majorly the reason why I try to look beyond the moment.
Like you reiterated, Nigeria is difficult, the economy itself isn't favourable and this is why I think we owe it ourselves to manage our finances and of course maintain Financial discipline.
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Using Hive as a case study, I don't have to spend a dime to be here yet I've gotten so much out of it. People have a lot of absurd money beliefs and in this country of ours, you'd not think twice to understand why we're so poor. But I think we're different. Being here and doing what we do makes us different.
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Yeah, you're totally right, being here totally makes us different by any miles, I guess we have learnt even more from being here.
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