Living Providently

When I was in high school up to my college years I had terrible experiences being indebted to my classmates. I used to be an entrepreneur back then, I was good in selling snacks and making my money doubled the capital. The only catch is, I hate to mention, I ate my own source of income. There was this old man who supplied “pulvoron” (a delicacy made from flour, sugar and powdered milk) for me to sell at school. At first, I can return the money to him right after school but the time came that I couldn’t stop myself from eating those pulburon. “It’s ok, I’ll only eat my part” I told myself. Sadly, I end up eating more than what is mine and realized that what I did is putting myself into trouble. For a high school student like me, it was really hard to pay for more than what my parents give me for “baon” (allowance). It took me about 5 months to pay him off! I remember I wrote a letter telling him how much sorry I am for not showing up till I was able to pay for what I owed. It was really hard to be in that kind of situation. I felt so degraded. I hardly learned my lesson, I knew it’s difficult to get out of that dilemma I created but I guess it’s my lack of discipline which is the root cause of it all.

I want to share the things I learned as I get matured about financing. Here’s how we can live providently.

Avoiding excessive debt

Perhaps, we all have different stories about how we were once indebted to someone or how you are still being indebted till now…whatever that might be, the first step is obvious,avoid debts!

Don’t get me wrong; to incur debt is necessary, depending on our circumstances. Unfortunately however, additional debt is incurred when we cannot control our wants and addictive impulses.

You see how burdened you’ll be to think of paying your debts, with or without interest, when you receive your wage, instead of allotting that money for savings or other important things to buy. When you owe someone money, you are considered as a slave to the creditor. Whatever he wishes for you to do, you’ll be obliged to extend more effort because you only not owe him money but you owe him what he himself worked hard for!

Being content with what we have

My situation was already tough because I had to travel 2 hours from our house to my school with an amount of money enough for my fare alone. No more for lunch. Funny I was able to survive. Fortunately, I was able to look for a part time job when I started my fourth year in college. “I can now somehow provide for my school expenses and help mom pay for my boarding house expense”, I uttered to myself. To my surprise, my wage which was actually enough to make my life ends meet was not budgeted well. That was because of what we call “greed”…I thought of buying stuff which I thought I needed but at the end of the day, I learned I really didn’t. Though those stuff made me happy “but for a season only” because it left me burdened again. By and by I saw how money works…my colleagues would normally treat themselves every pay day thinking it’s only for some time that they may enjoy their salary. Little realizing a few more days before the next pay day, they are already broke.

Joyfully living within our means

I’m now happily married. And you know what? My husband and I started living together without any debts incurred from our wedding preparation. We made sure we keep our wedding celebration simple. We almost got a loan to buy our own house and lot but good thing it didn’t happen. We realized that we can buy our own house with our hard earned money at some future time, even a better house and lot! It just feels good to start this way. Not being tied up to an obligation with others makes you move freely. You can provide for your own, you can also bless other people’s lives instead of being a burden to them.

Diligently saving and preparing for rainy-day emergencies

One of life’s little great pleasures is to find money in your pocket! My husband, I can say is the opposite of me. He learned to save and be thrifty even when he was young. He used to insert money on his books, closets and I guess every where he can keep it then he forgets about it. I too, do the same thing now. We diligently save money, though it’s not a large yet, at least we feel secure. He’s just a good influence to me!

I wish I had known these things back then but anyway, what matters is that I learned and will continue to learn with him!

Source: http://vernarbustillo.hubpages.com/hub/Living-Providently