Pay Yourself First
When I was a kid we ate together as a family almost every night of the week My mother was not that interested in cooking as a major part of her life so two or three nights a week and every Sunday we ate out .
I had no idea till well into adult life that this family pattern gave my kid brother and me a big head start in many important areas of developing skill sets in language and how money and business worked. This happened because at these family meals the food was not the major focus. The conversation was the main course.
The table was an open forum with the kids having a full membership in the thought exchanges that took place. Meals were really fun since humor had a significant seat at the table.
My Dad had risen through hard work from meager financial circumstances to having a successful business and did not hesitate to describe to us his thoughts on business, money and getting people to work together.
One of his mandates concerning money received as payment for work performed was that you Pay Yourself First. Take a moment to think about that.
When the paycheck comes in we ordinarily apportion it between housing, food, utilitiesand the various fixed costs it takes to get us to the next paycheck. Somehow there is always some temptation that comes up that makes the next paycheck arrival seem to be a little too late for comfort.
Budgets are tough for most people to make and stick to, so the Pay Yourself First system is an easy first step in organizing a sensible financial growth structure. Simply go through your check book for six months and add up the payments you have made to the required areas in the business of your life. Movies, concerts, dinner out, six packs of beverages and checks written for things not needed to stay alive and be sheltered from the storm are not to be added to this total. Take the total of required payments in the six month period and divide by six. You now pretty much know what is needed each month to cover the essentials for existing. The rest is for living. Then you decide how much of the living portion you intend to Pay Yourself. The Pay Yourself portion is paid before anything else and it goes into a bank account that provides interest. Do not put it in a piggy bank, not under the mattress or in the sock drawer—put it in the bank in an interest bearing account!.
Then sit down and pay the essentials
If the remaining living portion is too small to satisfy you, there are things you need to do which I will address in later Posts.
My Dad also firmly believed that anyone who was still in bed at 6am on a working day was not serious about making any real amount of money. He gave exceptions to this pronouncement to musicians, restaurant workers and athletes. Computer programmers did not exist in his world. I am sure he would have expanded his list to include certain categories of workers in the Cyber World. I believe Dad was correct on this point and I have followed an early rising practice all my working life.
Get up a little early tomorrow to work out the details of the Pay Yourself First program if you are one of the many whose money runs out before the month ends.
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