The Real Cost of Nkwobi in 2019
The real cost of weekly Friday night Nkwobi might actually be our financial freedom.
It’s a new year and as is always the case we set new goals and resolutions with hopes to move closer to the ideal version of ourselves. In some cases, these could be financial goals – blueprints to finally navigate us to the financial promised land.
Unfortunately for most of us these resolutions fade and are forgotten sometime in February or March.
Old spending habits return and before long we (once again) start sacrificing our long-term financial stability for Nkwobi, Pounded Yam and Efo Riro on Friday nights. I can’t lie, I love Nkwobi and don’t joke with Pounded Yam - especially with ‘correct’ Banga Soup and tender goat meat. 😍😍😍😍 Kai!!
However, the cost of some habits stack up rapidly and could be holding us back from financial freedom. The real cost of weekly Friday night Nkwobi might actually be our financial freedom. This is worth taking a moment to think about!!
The question then is - how does one make a financial resolution and stick with it? I don’t know if there is one correct answer to this question. Small habit changes, discipline, determination, unshaken resolve and so on - these those buzz positive-thinking words, are normally thrown around freely at this time of the year. They have a place and should not be ignored but reality constantly reminds us that we need more than buzz words to break old habits.
Having a structure to enforce new habits is far more valuable than simply believing that our mind is made up for this year to be different. For me that structure is a simple principle (you may have heard of) that is called Pay Yourself First.
Pay Yourself First
Have you ever over-spent on an item one month and promised to make it up the next month with more savings? Somehow another month passes, and you still don’t do it. The problem is likely that by the time you have paid for everything else like rent, utility bills, groceries - without forgetting Nkwobi and Pounded Yam, you don’t have enough left to save. This becomes an unending cycle.
So, what does Pay Yourself First really mean? It means saving before you do anything else. So, rather than wait till the end of the month to see what is left to save, make your savings first, a priority as soon as you get paid, and then you get to spend whatever is left. It is best if you can automate the savings, so that it leaves your account before you even have access to it.
In a way you are probably already doing this with your tax payments. You NEVER miss your tax payments because it is taken out and only what is left is credited to your account. If the money is not in your account, you'd be amazed by how quickly you'd automatically adapt to whatever is left.
After paying yourself first, should you leave all the money in a savings account or could you get your money to start making you more money? I believe getting your money to work for you is a no-brainer.
In our next article we'd be sharing how you could do this by investing in dividend stocks. Make sure you look out for the article next week.
If you don’t send this article to 100 people in 24 hours, nothing will happen to you, but we'd be most grateful if you do. Besides, sharing this with your friend might prove more valuable than buying them Nkwobi next Friday!
We'd like to wish you a very happy 2019, and hope we'd be able to equip you with tools to achieve your financial goals this time around.
Best regards, Yochaa
To download the Yochaa Mobile App:
