Pay Yourself First, The Money That You Invest in Yourself
February 20th, 2009 | 
Author: Of all the keys to creating abundant wealth there is probably none more important than paying yourself first! This is not money that you spend on yourself but more to the point, money you invest in yourself. The long term rewards of adopting this ‘habit of the wealthy’ can’t be stressed enough! You see, it’s not just about building wealth but the things you learn in the process.
Because we are not taught such things in school our introduction to the world of money is often started on a poor footing. The ease of borrowing money and persistent advertising gears us up for a life of spending. When we are young the message we hear is not the one we should be hearing. We are seduced by the money moguls into thinking that immediate gratification is ok. The trap is primed; welcome to shark ‘in(fv)ested’ waters!
Jim Rohn once said that the difference between the rich and poor is that the poor spend their money and invest the rest whilst the rich invest their money and spend the rest. Because most of us adopt an attitude of ‘have money will spend’ we fall into the first category. Little do we know we are setting ourselves up for a life of servitude!
Are you a slave to money or a master of it?
When we borrow money we effectively become an asset of someone else. Our money starts to control us because we are committed to the repayments we have to make. In an effort to keep our current standard of living we borrow some more and suffer the effects of compound interest in reverse. The cycle gets even harder to break because we often borrow money to invest in more liabilities. The very thing we purchased is an additional money drain that we often don’t account for in our budgeting.
When we ‘pay ourselves first’ our philosophy for building wealth is based on solid foundations. The additional responsibility of investing money wisely is a great introduction to financial management.
With a bit of discipline, investing in yourself is not such a hard thing to do. There are many good investment opportunities that allow people to make small investments on a monthly basis. By taking these opportunities we begin to understand how money works and what it means to be on the right side of compound interest. We begin to make money work for us and spend less time working for it. Our focus changes from investing in liabilities to investing in assets. This is the true road to building wealth beyond reason!
