Spending - Our way of living?

“Through want of enterprise and faith, men are where they are, buying and selling and spending their lives like servants.”

Henry David Thoreau

        There is a quote by Will Rogers, a quote dear to me, that says the following: WE SPEND MONEY WE DON’T HAVE, TO BUY THINGS WE DON’T NEED, MAINLY TO ENABLE US TO IMPRESS PEOPLE WE DON’T EVEN REALLY LIKE. I made it all capital letters because every single letter is worth its truth. I hope that you are not one of those individuals who fall within this category?

My question to you today is, how many things do you possess for the sake of its practicality and necessity, or for the sake of impressing others? The Cartesian dictum of “I think therefore I am” (Cogito ergo Sum), has even been altered to read: “I buy therefore I am.” Some actually think that they can find the worth of their existence in their capacity to spend. On the topic of spending, Artemus Ward was right in asking people to first draw their salary before starting to spend it. Most of our spending habits are not something to write home about, the problem is that people have spending habits of billionaires but, according to Gordon Auchincloss, they have the budgets of millionaires.

Charles Jaffe said that it is not our salaries that makes us rich, it is rather our spending habits that do so. In keeping yesterday’s meditative piece into mind with regard to differentiating between needs and wants, and you take today’s piece to heart, then I hope that this may encourage you to think twice before going on an unaffordable spending spree. Always spend wisely whenever you do so, and remember, it is not wrong to spend, but spend it on needy things, and not to impress others. The worth of your existence lies within you, you cannot find it in the acquisition of things. Hope to see you here again tomorrow.

To buy or not to buy, that is the question,

if Shakespeare would allow me?

Moderate spending is a more logical derivation,

Characterizing you as high-mindedly.

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