Saving For A Rainy Day

Once you start getting into adulthood or carrying on any form of responsibilities, the next thing is you have to do is save… save… SAVE!

I mean, my introduction to saving was my mum helping me to “hold” money my relatives would give me for the holidays or my birthdays. The money, I would never get back but who hasn’t gone through that? My next understanding of saving was piggy banks and boxes to place my little change in.

It dawned on me in my early teens that I never really saved for something for me simply because I never saw money as something to collect but something to manage and give or share. Someone would always be in need and if I could, I would give. I’m saying it like I was born into wealth and extreme opulence but even from my humble beginnings, I would try to save something. My father has always been big on savings and investments so he kind of gave all of us a big heads-up on what to expect with finances. Even with all that, I was never crazy about saving money unless it was for a particular thing.

As I got older, I understood why I had to save. My initial understanding was I had to save mainly for emergencies so that if something happened, I would have something to fall back on. Emergency money was very necessary for me, especially as the firstborn. When I was in my final year in Uni and had both my brothers in the same school as me. Emergencies would come up with someone being sick or an assignment needing to get done ASAP. I was the one who had to get up and settle something immediately. I was the first line of security and that was what I believed I was saving for.

Now, with the presence of a thousand and one saving apps and more needs, I do a lot better at financing my needs. I’m a lot more decisive about what I want when I put it down and these apps help a lot. Once I write it down and have a figure in front of it, best believe I’m working towards it. Also, I keep a stash for just keeping sake. Not for emergencies but just to have.

However, when you're employed or newly employed, everybody wants to talk about saving everything possible for a rainy day. I know it mostly comes from a good place and advising a person not to be irresponsible but I know what I want for myself. I know how I want my life to look in a few years at least so I know what I’m planning towards. 

To be honest, I’m slowly getting to the point where I want to be irresponsible once in a very long while. I don’t want to save every single penny that is free for a rainy day. I want to enjoy some things for myself. I will eat shawarma and enjoy life because see… rain is falling.