Being broke is never, ever an enjoyable experience. Our society is built on capitalism and as such monetary value and materialism is reinforced and beaten into us from a very early age. That means if you're lucky and are born into a nice wealthy family then you won about 90% of the life's challenges but for those who weren't so lucky, it can be a long, hard and psychologically draining road throughout life. Beyond that are those who have money and have blown it away, only to find themselves on the lower rungs of society (capitalism means that it's a lot harder to fall down the economic ladder and climb back up or simply climb up in general). So throughout all of this what does being broke teach us, well a lot actually.
A desperate man always shows his true colors because they have nothing to lose and it is a very true one. You start to see what your morals are and where your values lie; you gain an entirely different outlook on life compared to the more financially fortunate. Being broke, we're more likely to emphasize with others and share in the challenges of making it to the next month without going insane. We also become more retrospective and aware of our station in life, looking back on lessons learned, where we want to be and most prominently what can we do to get there. It's not enough for us to take time out for a back-then session, we're constantly looking forward because when you're broke you don't have a choice. Being broke changes our thinking going from wanting to to having to, going from I can't to I have no choice, from maybe another time to this should've been done yesterday. You develop a hustle-or-die mentality, a special kind of work ethic that comes from our will to survive and that experience strengthens us. We learn to be humble, knowing even if we work our way back up who's to say it can't all be taken away the next day. When we're broke we learn to stop and acknowledge and appreciate the smaller things because since we can't control money like wealthier folks we have to look to other things to draw our energy from and often, it's the things you wished you paid more attention to before. When we're broke, we see who our friends are and opposite we pay more attention to the relationships around us. Here friendship is not built on materialism, being broke we have little to give other than ourselves and often that can be more than enough. I am not saying we don't have those moments of hopelessness and despair, it is natural that we do (I mean, we're broke) but many times these hardships can be a blessing in disguise as it teaches us something, something that can only be gained when you have little whether you're born into it or fall into it. At the end of the day we are taught many things when we have little, but the most important is that those lessons stay with us long after we've risen to financial independence. Were you born into poverty or fell on hard times? What did you learn and did those values stay with you? Feel free to share with us. |
Frank Sheppard
NOTE: all opinions/views represented here are my own and do not reflect on any third party that I am affiliated with. Archives
May 2016
Categories
All
|