Sometimes you get good advice and it’s not till much later that you realize the wisdom of the advice. Such is the case with advice from my dad. He often provided unsolicited advice about a host of things, which was usually unappreciated and not fully understood at the time. As a trainer for a large life insurance company he loved his job and was always in training mode, even at home. The best piece of advice he ever gave me was: Best Advice My Dad Ever Gave Me
A portion of everything you earn is yours to keep.
I found the advice to be totally obvious and pretty annoying. “Yeah dad, ALL of my money is mine to keep!” After I shouted back to him in the way only a 16 year old teenager (with a new job) can do, my dad calmly asked a series of questions. How much is gas? How much is it to go the movies? How much is it to repair your car? How much is it to buy clothes? After we got through listing out the things I spent my money on, I began to realize that this advice was not so dumb and obvious. By the time we got done with the list there was really no money left over. There was no money left over to save!
In the course of this conversation, he advised me to “pay yourself first” (another incarnation of the same advice- take your pick). He told me that if I did not pay myself first that I would have no money when I needed it. I would have no money for emergencies. I would have no money to buy a house. I would have no money to buy a new car. I would have no money to start a business. I would have no money to eat. Essentially, I would have no money for anything that I might like to do later. This was a scary prospect. Best Advice My Dad Ever Gave Me
As a life insurance agent and financial adviser, these words ring true to me daily. I talk to clients who have money and to those who do not. Those who have money (accumulated through their own hard work) have learned the discipline of paying themselves first. They treat their forced savings as a bill just like any other…
This article was sourced from Senior.com.