Frugality and Lots of Kids
Frugality. When you hear the term, what do you think? Why should I be
frugal? These are just a few of the questions that people often ask
themselves when we live in a country that has much. The Scribner-Bantam
English Dictonary defines the word frugal as "thrifty, economical, to
use or supply sparingly." With this definition, one can summize that
the term means to live as cost effective as possible. Bearing this in
mind, with lots of kids this becomes something of a necessity.
Finances often play a major role in the choices and the decisions that
we make in life. In society today, the life choice not to have as many
children stems from the belief that life is very, very expensive. With
a frugal mentality, this would no longer be a major consideration.
True, when you have mutiple children, there are more people in the
family that have basic needs. It is in determining the needs of your
family that makes the choice of being frugal even more important.
As a mother of LOK, I have learned the value of the frugal lifestyle.
It is a different way of living; you must learn to think in live in a
manner that allows you to be open to any and all opportunites to save
money. Being frugal does not just include your normal day-to-day
shopping, but all of the things that your family spends money on.
Spending, spending, spending and charge it, charge it, charge it have
become a way of life in America today. The debt level that American
families carry has reached an all-time high. Many families have had to
succumb to a more frugal lifestyle by virtue of no longer having
employment. With record layoffs and decreasing salaries, the need to be
frugal becomes even more important today.
Having financial savvy entails many things that most of us were not
taught to do by or parents or society at large. For instance, how many
of you actually balance your checkbook? Do you know the best investment
and saving stratgies for you and your family? What about the future of
your children? How will you pay for a college education? Am I saving
enough money for my retirement? These are some of the questions that we
should be asking ourselves as parents of LOK. Financial literacy is a
learned skill, one that must be developed and cultivated just as any
other skill is. Suprisingly enough, this is something that most people
don't talk about. There are many taboos in our society that one does
not talk about, and money is the major one that is never discussed. It
is considered rude to ask someone outright how much money they
make.
How many people have you known in your life that you thought had
everything, only for you to discover later that they were in debt to a
point that you could not even imagine? There is a Lending Tree
commerical that speaks to this point. The man in the commerical states
that he has a "nice four bedroom home" in a "nice neighboorhood." He
has a beautiful family, a new car, a Golf club membership...etc, then
the tag line comes: "How do I do it? I am in debt up to my eyeballs."
In our society's effort to have "things," we may have forgotten the
actual value of family. In our holy quest to acquire, I think that we
have forgotton the worth of family and personal relationships. We all
know of people who say that they are stopping with two children because
that is all that they can afford. We have all heard rude comments about
bringing the rest of the country (and the world) down becuase we have a
large family. What is strange today is that societal view is that
things--not people, not children--are most important.
Finances have played a major role in the destruction of many
relationships. Whether it has been a business, personal, family or any
other close relationship, the financial factor cannot be overlooked.
The main goal of frugality is to face our deepest fears: To confront
some of the things that we do not want to confront, and in the end, know
that we are making the best possible choices for our personal life and
our families' life.
Successful money management is key to achieving this goal and frugality
has a very important place. Starting to mange what we spend, want and
need is the key to taking care of our LOK families sucessfully. We are
not the norm, but we can be leaders because of the fact that we have LOK
we have already proven by necessity that we are better money managers
than most. The goal of this site is to help with the basics of money
management and developing the skills that will help us to raise happy
and content LOK families.
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Article by: Sonni Mata
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