I finally found the owner of the voice who taught me a new thing about money yesterday which I already shared with you. His name is Marty Barde, and I already fell in love with this character. He's the male version of the life I want to live. A human who lives frugally not out of necessity but because he understands that just as we have been given some things in life, it is easy to be taken away as soon as they come.
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Living frugally for those who understand the essence involves being able to live on very little compared to how much they are earning. This is a good thing when life deals with an individual so badly that depression might set in and encourage them to take their lives. This individual if he had been living frugally would have been able to overcome this series of life's uncertainties and moments of living because right before all the bad things happened to him, he already learned to live through life on little and not-so much.
So he wouldn't have anything to lose. He wouldn't need to save face for any reason. He wouldn't have friends to impress so being able to live through it all is possible because no one is asking too much of him or even expecting too much from him. I think the reason most people who have been in money once and suddenly lose it are often finding it difficult to stay sane and build again is because they had established a certain kind of lifestyle around them. It could be that a lot of people have grown accustomed to them burning money like cheap coals without a care in the world. So waking up one morning and suddenly realizing that life has taken a different turn and they may not be able to live their flashy lifestyle anymore, they resort to taking their lives.
If it were a woman married to a rich person who lived extravagantly and burned holes through her husband's money, she wouldn't take her life, she would simply ask for a divorce and try to savor anything that's left of the man especially when there was a prenuptial agreement in the first place. So the man is left to put up with the ruins of whatever financial disaster he fell into. He's left to think about where it could have gone wrong. And he will be doing it alone. Plus, Morgan already said the quickest way to run out of money is to spend it to show that you have it.
But Marty Barde is a good example that the kind of scenario above wouldn't be the problem of a frugal person. If you weren't living a flashy lifestyle, no one would know when you are dealing with a financial crisis. Hell, no one will even take notice of you in the first place. But if you suddenly have a ton of money to spend, eyebrows will rise because, in reality, they are not used to you spending that kind of money.
Without digressing, Marty Barde indeed ran into financial troubles. His business partner stole from a drug cartel Lord, Del, and after Del found out, he killed everyone except Marty Barde because he promised to get his money back by moving to a new city and helping him clean his money. Del asked him to pay back the $8 million that his partner stole from him and Marty Barde was only able to do that within 48 hours because he had that money sitting in different accounts, probably earning interest or not. It doesn't matter if it was at this point, the only thing that matters is how it saved his life and that of his family.
When he was able to come up with that money, I remembered Morgan Housel again, and how he had told me to save hard. To not save because I need a reason to do it. But I should do it as hard as I can and as frequently as possible because I might not be able to control how the world or the economy turns but I can most certainly control how much I can save.
Now, Marty Barde couldn't control how greedy his business partner got and how he tried to mess with the cartel's money, but, he was able to control saving up to $8 million that saved him and his family. Plus, the best part is, Del, asked him to use the money he returned and clean it to prove that he knew what he was talking about. Not only did he save his life and that of his family, he found a reason to start all over again, on a clean slate, instead of ending up six feet under the ground.
Let me remind you right here that Morgan Housel said,
If you view building wealth as something that requires more money or big investment returns, you may become as pessimistic as the energy doomers were in the 1970s. The path forward will look hard and out of your control. But if you view it as powered by your own frugality and efficiency, the destiny is clearer. The Psychology of Money - Morgan Housel
In a nutshell, your wealth-building destiny will be clearer when you learn to be frugal and save as hard as you can. It will help you make certain U-turns that may not be possible for someone without a cent to his name in a savings account and that could change your life forever.
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