Man: “Would you marry me?”

Woman (in typical Msian radio squeaky voice, sort of like she inhaled all the helium from a blimp) : “But you’ve got RM5000 outstanding on your credit card balance, how can you afford it?”

Man (enthusiastically): “No problem, EAC bank now have -Just use your card as if the $ is already there, and when you realized you can’t pay us back, no worries, you could just sell your car, your house…even your wife plan!

I can’t believe my ears when I heard this just now. And I can’t believe people fall for this. Shame on the so-called financial institution(s), shame on the agency who came out with this ‘creative’ concept, shame on the sorry-state of our financial education, or lack off.

Nobody heard of saving towards something nowadays, nor having a planned investment that will gradually reap the return- which one can use towards purchases such as these.

Flabbergasted, it’s the word.

Being a start up entrepreneur, and for many other entrepreneurs, one of the challenges is to keep overheads & costs low.

One of the way to do that, is to DIY, do it yourself for certain tasks. Especially in the IT field, some things are free (open source).

For us, holding on to whatever funds we have with an iron fist is vital. Hence, yes, many things we D-I-Y. Website, some simple copies, creative ideas (Boy,we don’t lack in this area for sure!).

However, as I came to find out increasingly, we need to strike a balance somewhere, and not be a maniac DIYer. There are just some things/areas you can’t DIY. What are they?

Simple- things that you don’t have a bloody clue about! Or things that are ridiculously cheap to outsource, and darn mundane to do, stuffing greeting cards into envelopes & licking stamps for example. Or copywriting, for heaven sake. If you are not sure you can write copy that sells, better get someone else to do it.

If it’s gonna take you a lonnnnnnnnnnnnnng time to just figure out the how to’s, that’s gonna cost you.

Time cost. How much $ you actually throw away by putting your time into doing tasks that can be outsourced affordably. As a smart entrepreneur, you gotta know which area you want to spend your time on. If your time is better spent in front of your clients, or developing business, etc,  that is the time that costs & rewards the most.

Rich Dad Poor Dad Revisited

1.7.09 1.49pm

Life: Rereading Rich Dad Poor Dad >10 years after I first read it…It’s not until my husband bought the book last month (I can’t imagine anyone never read it b4), that I was casually flipping thru it again. Then I found out…I thought I knew it then what all this is about. I thought that all the seminars I’ve been attending this 2 years gave the knowledge to me.

Well, it only DID recently. And I found that, there’s so many nuggets of wisdom in that book that I ‘GET IT’ now, not when I first read it 10 yrs ago.

I was critizing myself recently, that how can I read the book, and 10 years later, I’m still where i am!! (Yes, 10 years is THAT fast) But, it’s because I don’t fully get it then.

My fundamentals in financial education and mindset were screwed, blueprints were wonky.

Now, many of the words just jumped out to me, yes, I can relate to this, yes, i can relate to that. I’m like, omg, and this is 10 years ago that Robert Kiyosaki was talking abt it, I finally, truly get it. And finally I can see how much i have grown since that young, green chick 10 years ago whose dreams of finacial idenpendence were built on wobbly ground.

The recent Never Work Again seminar (unless you choose to) smashed a lot of my old beliefs that pulled me back. Yes, granted the seminar was business orientated, they are selling their seminars, but there’s also tremendous information & knowledge that shook my beliefs.

I’ll spare you the details, but I’ll leave you with this, if you can ‘get it’, you are fast forwarding your way to true success not solely and shallowed-ly measured by big house, big cars & Coach bags.

” First, you get FREE, then you get rich as a bonus”.

Comments & discussions welcome.