To read the 1st part of this two-piece essay, click here.
The following is my life memoir while living in Argentina. I think this excerpt from my journal fits well with the previous post and flows well with the rest of the essay.
I am in Argentina, and I have one stream of income, and that is a salary of $4k a month.
While I was writing this, I felt ashamed that it was still that low. But at the same time, I must remember I had almost no income 9 months ago.
It bothers me that even in cheap Argentina, I cannot live in whichever apartment I want, eat stake in restaurants instead of cooking, and think can I afford certain trips in the country?
I find it disgusting having to worry about pricing. It takes my attention from my ideas and actions that are scalable. I squander my attention on irrelative stuff, such as worrying if I can afford something. I am trying to optimize all day for maximal time efficiency when the first thing I should fix is attention preservation.
I have to make so much money that I cannot spend it even if I try aggressively.
That way, I will save without having to put a lot of attention to it.
Also, I think it hurts my ego, knowing that I am still not rich enough to afford the basic lifestyle I desire.
I am not seeking yachts, jets, and expensive parties, at least not that intensely, I just want to be able to travel, have fun with friends, and eat good food.
I have 27x the salary of locals, and it is not enough for me. Am I crazy not being able to live on it? I don’t think so. It isn’t that I am not grateful for the income I have, but I need more, and I demand myself to make more because I think that by creating more streams of income, I will confirm my inner value.
This sounds so lame, but it is true.
I don’t know how else to measure it…
I will pause here.
I am not being completely honest with myself.
…
Yes, I know how to measure my success without using money as a measurement vehicle.
All my life, I used the correct unit to measure success until recently, when I abandoned them.
I always knew, and I still know, that the only way to measure success is through the quality of your relationships with other people and your health.
Knowledge, the same as money, plays a huge role in our day-to-day life.
But alone in the vacuum, they are useless.
We tend to lose the compass of life values, but when our existence gets jeopardized, we sober up and reevaluate them.
Our life choices compound you; either make them work for you or against you.
Our life choices compound whether you like it or not.
Your life habits are the highest form of leverage on your time.
Therefore, before I make any serious money, I must ensure my habits are impeccable so that I wouldn’t ruin myself.
Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedEnd of memoir.
Learning how to reduce your life habits will save you more money than learning how to decrease your spending habits.
It's not your spending habits that make you rich. It's your lifestyle habits.
If you are a status maniac and you have an addiction to your ego, you will probably waste money on branding clothes and luxury cars to impress and gain status in a social hierarchy with external stuff while not having to pay for this month's rent.
"If two people have the same goal, you know nothing about the similarity of their results. But if two people have the same daily habits, you can infer quite a bit about the similarity of their results. Your results are largely a byproduct of your habits.”-James Clear
I am all for habit reduction; therefore, your spending, because healthy life doesn’t cost much, and wealth building is not nuclear science.
Analyze your day
Track all your spending
Eliminate all unhealthy activities, habits, and people
Reorganize your day
Count again how much it will cost you to live a new improved lifestyle
It is almost always less than it was before, and as you can see, we didn’t want to decrease your spending we wanted to reduce your habits.
I am all about
Habits reduction
Business Creation
Deflationary assets accumulation
Happiness and Spirituality
Family and Friends
Partner and Kids
Active Lifestyle
For this equation to make sense, continue to the following article:
"Financial peace isn't the acquisition of stuff. It's learning to live on less than you make, so you can give money back and have money to invest. You can't win until you do this." — Dave Ramsey
I agree with Dave here. No external stuff can bring you financial peace. It is a state of mind. You can find people living on $300 a month and saving $100 and having such a firm belief that they have financial peace, while also you can find billionaires stressing about their financial freedom and peace. Also, I would argue that you don’t have to learn to live on less than you make if your lifestyle is right and you accumulate a healthy stack of habits. Once you establish healthy habits, you won’t have to worry about learning to live on less than you make. The only thing you can focus on is how to make more money. Destruction is expensive. Holistic life is not.
"It's not how much money you make, but how much money you keep, how hard it works for you, and how many generations you keep it for." — Robert Kiyosaki
Same here. I agree with Robert, but I believe that person with no addictions doesn’t have to worry about how much money he has to keep. And then it comes to the end, it is all about how much money you can make.
It is easier to make money than to save it.
Always was and always will be.
Whoever says differently lies.
I hope you guys like this longer type of essay.
Let me know what you think.
Sending kisess,
Andela <3