Ron was young, good-looking, and in love with Noriko, a beautiful young Filipino-Japanese girl. Everything in their world was rosy and sweet as they were lost in the intoxicating spin of adolescent love. Ron was a simple and naive provincial boy while Noriko lived a more sophisticated life bi-locating between Manila and Tokyo, having finished her mid-school in London. Although they were a great match physically, their cultural, educational, and financial backgrounds were disparate and incongruent.
The relationship that seemed so right was actually doomed from the very start. When it finally ended, Ron could not get over why Noriko had suddenly turned cold. With her, he’s had the best time of his life and she made him think that she, too, was madly in love. Being dropped was the most painful and ego-deflating thing Ron had ever experienced. He thought that if he would lose her, life would have neither meaning nor hope. He had actually pinned his life on her.
In his anger, fury, incomprehension, and dark despair, Ron slashed his wrist, wanting to die. It was not a pleasant sight. Friends took him to the hospital in time and luckily saved his life. It took a long while for Ron to get over his emotional crisis, but the passing of the years slowly healed his wounds. Today, he looks back at his immature stupidity and laughs. Had he died, he would not have had his three beautiful children who bring so much joy to his life.
Lesson 1: Learn To Say Goodbye
It is never good to pin your life on someone else. You must realize that you were born alone and that you are going to die alone. No matter how much someone loves you, he/she won’t die with you. (Gone are the Egyptian days when the whole household, including the priests, slaves, and pets, died along with the pharaoh.) One big life lesson to engrave onto your mind is this: Learn to say goodbye to someone who has said goodbye to you.
Whether it is a person or a thing that you have lost, practice the law of judicious detachment. Focus on yourself, give yourself some importance, maintain your self-esteem, and elevate your sense of self-worth. Say goodbye to him/her or it, and move on. Ron’s resorting to committing suicide was indeed imprudent and juvenile. Killing himself would not have gotten back the other person’s sympathy, only her ire. She has said goodbye; she has dropped him. The sensible thing to do would have been to gather himself together, make himself strong, and move forward.
Lesson 2: Be Self-Sufficient
Ella was a devoted wife to Mark and loving mother to their two children. She had finished a course in pharmacy but was never able to practice because she fell in love and got married right after college. Mark, with his macho thinking, never allowed Ella to work. He pounded on her that it was his duty as a responsible husband to provide for her and their family, and that her proper place was in the home to take care of the growing children.
Ella never questioned the decision for her to solely stay home because she felt her husband’s sincere love and concern for her and their family. She loved Mark deeply and had pinned her life on him. Mark was hardworking and driven, and was soon promoted to being vice president of the company he worked for. Through his efforts, they were able to buy a nice house in a plush subdivision, two cars, and would even go once in a while on pleasure trips abroad. Fortune kept smiling on the young, happy family until one fateful day.
On his way to an out-of-town sales conference, Mark got into a vehicular accident and instantly died. Ella’s world suddenly crashed and turned black. She was into deep mourning and felt so completely alone. She didn’t know how to go on and support her two kids because she never in her life experienced earning a single cent. Clueless and confused, she sought the help of family and friends to teach and orient her to the realities of working and making a living.
Big life lesson number two is this: Don’t pin your financial life on somebody else. Blessed is the child who has got his own, as they say. When you have your own money, you don’t have to ask for approval whenever you want to spend it. But before you can stand financially on your own, you must first learn how you can best make money. Your interests, talents, abilities, education, passions, and connections will lead you to your best occupation or profession.
Everyone should be financially independent from other people. Don’t pin your life on your company; it can close. Don’t pin your life on somebody else; he/she can divorce you, leave you or even die on you. You have only yourself to trust finance-wise, and you have only yourself to blame, too. In this life, believe it or not, your wallet is your wife.
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