The country that I am in was not the perfect democratic model, but it had a strong currency, even at the international level "The Silver Bolivar", with the figure of Simon Bolivar of libertarian character.

The Bolivar had the basic requirements as an exchange currency, and a reference of value to be recognized as the only currency in Venezuela and to acquire products, services, and any other goods for their value in each of its denominations, without the need for other foreign currencies to preserve its value in time.

Today everything is different to stay within the budget with our monetary sign, the bolivar (it is totally devalued), it does not meet any requirement to be classified as such.... today the circulating currency ($) is the one that moves in a black market that is taking us to inflationary indexes that are lost of sight because the salaries and wages in the public company are paid in bolivars, only those who work for the private company receive dollars (underpaid) because the salaries are very low in that currency... Observe and judge yourself.

I make this frame of reference (background) to put in context for those who read this post

Many years ago we (my husband and I) made a daily record of all our expenses because we wanted to know our real expenses, so for a year we were writing down in a notebook daily even the snacks and parking.

The result allowed us to know what was the "ant cost" of sweets, cakes, and ice cream that you do not realize, but that adds up at the end of the month. We wanted to buy goods and take vacations, and we had to budget, you know schools, extracurricular activities, ...for the family, two (2) daughters and us.

Since then, we have learned to budget

We made lists to work from. I remember that even when the girls (daughters) were grown up, they used to say: "tell daddy because what goes on the budget list does not happen". As time went by we already knew the minimum necessary expenses, the payments, and how much we could save.

It was a very different economy and so small the national production diminished (this country was the fifth economy in the Americas)

When the balance went against us, (situation, country) we thought we had to move to where the value of work was not deteriorated as in our country... To emigrate, however, the decision to do so was aborted for health reasons, it was when I got sick with cancer, and thank God that is past history, and today I am a healthy woman.

When inflation levels began to rise, superfluous expenses disappeared and expenses and income were evaluated weekly because the income became salt and water in bolivars and had to be exchanged quickly for goods and services or in another currency or good that was more stable. Thank God at that time we did not have any debt.

Today, we keep an eye on inflation. We keep making a list and budgeting our life, and expenses in our country, because they are always unpredictable and unstoppable. We try to keep the payments up to date because one day late you lose the effort to privilege food, health, study, and maintenance in that order. The entertainment we also have only if it is good, nice, and free, for now, we do a lot of walks in parks, beaches, nature, and morning yoga among other things.

I am one of those who think that dreams are not achieved only by dreaming, you have to work. And not only work, but work with discipline, and reevaluate to persist until the goal is achieved. It may not even resemble the original idea, but it was the goal that achieved the dream.

In short, a lot of rhetoric is diluted in the day-to-day and the difficulties of our lives, but it is true. A palpable reality that is for many unknown, for others unattainable, because of the hard struggle of changing habits.