DO YOU HAVE A PIG?

We've looked at at how to ensure we get our finances right by the way we think, because the way you think is responsible for the way you act. Therefore, how you handle money or what you do with it is mostly due to how you think. So, let me try and put this in your mind, if I can...

You need a pig!!!!

Yep! You heard me right. You need a pig. A money pig. A pig that helps you hold your excess money or change, if you have any. And you should have!!!! You must have!!!! If you choose not to have one, please stop complaining that you have no money.

The mentality of savings must be a top priority for you regardless of whether you are making regular income or not. You must entrench that habit into your mindset so that you don't get swept away when whatever you describe as good money eventually falls into your laps. So, my friend, get yourself a pig...a Savings Pig.

Aside from getting yourself hooked on a workable budget, which is very important if you must be financially free, the best way to even run that budget is to have all your spending organised into percentages. And do all you can to stick to those percentages no matter how your income fluctuates. It will do you a whole load of good.

I had my first encounter with the Savings Pig mentality as a young boy when my stepmother gave me a small raffia basket that we used as part of our sitting room decor at the time. I converted it into my own personal savings bank and often would actually put it on the pedestal above the window and many thought it was just a decor element in my room and hardly paid any attention to it. Risky, I know, but it was the only way I could disguise what it really was and what I was actually doing with it. It worked.

At the time, being pretty young, I didn't really understand money; I just wanted to have control over mine since I realized that my parents won't always give me money for what I craved for from time to time. And it always gave me satisfaction to see and know that I had money stashed away from the little pocket money my parents would give to me and my siblings for school every day. I used to pick out the very shiny coins from the money my parents gave me and dropped them inside my savings basket. It felt so good. 

Today am a whole lot more matured, more educated and obviously more enlightened and I've discovered that the best way to handle your money is to always have a percentage of it saved. The usual rule-of-thumb is to constantly put away between 10 - 15% of your income into your savings box or container or bank account or whatever else represents your Savings Pig to you. Please, hear me....you need to have your own pig. It's the best way to lock up some extra cash that will come in very handy for you in the future.

Nobody will ever plan your life for you except you yourself. Give this a pig a little test. It could save you more than you ever know. I still have my pig. It's no longer in the form of a small raffia basket but it still does the very same thing for me now as it used to many years ago. And am pretty glad indeed.