Recently, I was discussing with a friend, who was competing with her sister in selling their hand made beads. The conversation was about raising her prices from ten cents to twenty five cents per bead. I asked her what she needed to achieve from the increase and what areas of her life, that she feels the increase will make an impact, hence asking her the five most important things that matters to her in life.
She thought about it, looked at me and said in this order: “First, My Family, then My House, Television, Candy and then Money”. Impressed that she had come up with exactly five items, I probed a little deeper.
“Mary, what do you need to get the candy that you love?’
“Money”, she said.
“And how about the TV, what do you need to get that?”
“Money”
“And how about your house?”
“Money”, she replied once again.
And then I asked, “How about your family, what do you need to get them?”
Just as quickly, she replied, “Love”
“That’s right, “I said, but don’t you think that maybe you have to reorder your list? You see, if you need money to buy the candy, the house and the TV, then don’t you think money should be more important than what it can buy?
In that instance, she thought about it and said, I was right, and within that short period, I introduced her to the law of money, a law that serves as the foundation for wise spending.
THE LAW OF MONEY: PEOPLE FIRST.THEN MONEY.THEN THINGS
You see, most of us are just like Mary, we value things more than we value money. We care more about having what money can buy than we care about having money itself. When we follow the law of money, we will find out that, we are respectful of money, and if we follow it and keep what we have and spend, it will make us truly rich. We will analyze each category:
PEOPLE FIRST: We should always prioritize everything that is created by love, which include our Family, Friends, Partners, Children and Ourselves. The saying that goes that Money can’t buy love is true, and a life without love –regardless of how much money one has-is a poor life indeed.
THEN MONEY: Can you imagine going to someone’s house and having them proudly show you a room filled with thousands of dollar bills and telling you the history of how all that money came to be? You will be amazed at all that vulgarity, but at the same time, you will think nothing of it, when you compare it to another person's home that is filled with beautiful decorations, What did it take to decorate the home? Money. Money exchanged for furniture, paintings, carpeting, lamps and so on.
The difference in your perception is the VALUE SYSTEM that you applied- A Room filled with things is okay, whereas a room full of money is not.
THEN THINGS: When your financial priorities are in order; things come last.
In conclusion, when we work hard for our money, maybe forty hours or more a week and then go shopping, buy food, clothes and stuff, we usually say that we don’t know where the money went. This is also applicable, when we pay for services, that we really need; but why don't you consider this- CHANGE your perspective now, if we valued money over things and over items it can buy, then we would know exactly where our finance is going.
We should change our money/thing ratio, so that we will have more money than things, this will also encourage us to take great pleasure in seeing our money and watching it grow. With this approach, we would always know when we can afford something that we need and will be more likely to be able to buy the things we TRULY WANT to make us happy.
So next time, you go out to spend money, always remember that you are not throwing the money away, but you are exchanging it for something that has a value to you.
Please feel free to give us a call today to get your finances organized, so that you can capture where your expenses are going and invariably increase the value you need for the important areas in your life.
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