husband's family was never well to do
There's often a good reason why the family wasn't well off - because they didn't manage their finances properly; they probably had "a list".
There are many kinds of poverty. Many of them are, in various ways, hereditary. Not in a genetic way, but in a social way - memes, not genes.
You can have poverty where the family may well know HOW to manage their meagre finances, but due to ongoing expenses always cropping up, they never manage to do more than struggle on. In Australia we call them "battlers".
Then there are the people who simply spend money unwisely, who have little idea of how to really manage. They are often influenced unduly by the advertising industry, which spreads the message that you CAn have it now, that it's unreasonable of anybody to make you wait for what you want. Advertising uses words like "you deserve it", or "you're worth it", "when only the best will do" and so on. Take note - how many of these phrases can you find? The more vulnerable among us, and often the more envious and resentful, will then act on the impulse to get what they want NOW, and justify it with these phrases. Anyoone trying to put the brakes on is like the childhood memory of poverty which, according to the advertising, was needless self-sacrifice or worse, niggardly, miserly stinginess imposed by others out of a desire to be mean because OF COURSE we all can have whatever we want, can't we? That's what credit is for!
Inside a lot of people is the child who always wanted what the other kids had, who was placated with things instead of affection, who was taught early on that rewards are material. Often the lesson is taught by parents who felt the same way. Think "Gone With the Wind", end of the first half, Scarlett O'Hara clutching a handful of dirt and saying, "As God is my witness, I'll never be poor again!"
Put that mentality into someone who hasn't got the financial wit to be able to actually ORGANISE their own finances sensibly and what you get is the sense of aggrieved entitlement, coupled with financial irresponsibility.
You can overcome this and break the cycle but it takes a combination of therapy and financial counselling. Probably a whip and a chair, as well. You ned to dig deep and find out where the sense of entitlement comes from, deal with it and then learn the techniques for managing your finances sensibly.
Too often we are fooled by the belief that it's so much easier for everyone else; nobody else is struggling as we are (because we all hide it from one another socially - how much do you REALLY know about your neighbours' financial situation? Think of the movie "Fun With Dick and Jane" and how they struggled to keep up appearances, how broke they were so quickly because although they DID earn good money, they still didn't plan well. And how they still did their best to cover up their dire financial state. Our sense of entitlement is often aggravated by the mistaken belief that only WE are doing it tough. But especially these days, many more of us have it tough. And when we finally have a change in our luck and things look up, we so quickly forget. And remember - those who forget the past are condemned to re-live it.
I grew up poor, and resenting the apparent wealth of classmates. My best friend at the time WAS much better off financially. Where I was given a bookshelf one Christmas (which I had actually helped my mother to buy and then paint, thinking it was for my sister) my friend was given an in-ground swimming pool. When she was old enough her parents paid for her drivers licence costs, private lessons and then a new late-model car. My parents couldn't even cover the cost of my learner's permit. At school the noticeboard had the names of the scholarship kids and the bursary kids. It was good to be recognised for academic achievement, but those in control didn't seem to realise - the bursary, being means-tested, was an open announcement that those awarded a bursary were the poor kids. Those of us with our names listed as bursary holders tended to draw together in some sort of shameful and shamed camaraderie. There wasn't any real social stigma - just a personal sense of shame and embarrassment.
Something that helped me - was learning to "get over myself" and not waste time on pointless pride. There are times when survival is more important than pride. At this point I began to let go of comparisons with others, with worrying aboutwhether I had enough possessions to keep up appearances and instead to focus on what I needed, to get by. And how I could get it, with spending the minimum. When I was younger I wouldn't have been seen dead in a second-hand clothing place. But I happily accepted my sister's hand-me-downs. Crazy. Some second-hand things people have "standards" over. My mother would never allow any of us to wear second-hand shoes. As for anything we wore close to our bodies, such as pyjamas or underwear - NEVER! Beds - we could pass mattresses around from one family member to another, as long as we kept it quiet. But never touch something that came from an unknown source.
The day I scavenged an old mattress from the side of the road, so I would have something to sleep on that night - that was the day I realised that it was time to forget about appearances and focus on urgent needs.
If you're really hungry, you'll eat out of a bin. If you can afford not to, that's good. But if you can't prioritise effectively, the day will come when you will be sitting by the side of the road with your new speakers, hungry.
A gold brick is something a lot of us would love to have. But if you're alone on a desert island, that gold brick is useless. A fishing rod with an effective lure is worth many gold bricks, in that situation.
priority. common sense. Forgetting the sense of entitlement and recognising that we ALL pretend to be better off than we are and we should simply stop trying to compete - it's something to aim for.
I have friends who refuse to eat leftovers. They waste an awful lot and seem to think this is how everybody lives, how everybody SHOULD live. The thought of eating leftovers nauseates them, it would be to them an open admission that they're not doing their job financially. People have lost touch with how pioneers had to live, with how you cope when your survival depends on it. We forget our responsibilities to our past, to our upbringing, to the environment, to conserving resources, to society... we need to re-educate society.
husband & I used to do party plan sales. We did the best business in the poorest homes. We found the wealthiest clients bought the least while the poorer people, the battlers, seemed to have the most disposable income. It was in the Housing Commission homes, the subsidised housing occupied by people on welfare, that we saw the latest hire-purchase goods, the newest gadgets and the most up-to-date fashions. The women all had their hair professionally styled once a week and we got our biggest orders in these homes. Because the party plan system meant that we'd get more party bookings from each party (again, especially on the poorer areas) we would often meet the same people on the same circuit of friends. We 'worked' the same areas for several years and watched their lives. We finally got out of the business for a range of reasons, and felt relieved to be away from what we felt was immoral exploitation.
As I said before, some people are poor because they simply have had a run of bad luck - it can happen to anyone. Some people are poor because they are trapped in a poverty cycle. And some people keep themselves poor because their habits are wasteful, irresponsible and self-perpetuating. We learn these habits (good, bad or indifferent) as children and we carry them into our adult life. How well we manage to change our wealth situation is dependent on the sort of habits we learned, combined with how well we can make good use of whatever fortune comes our way.
If you have been raised to be irresponsible, it won't matter how much fortune comes your way, it will never be enough.
That is why you can't ever solve poverty by throwing money at it. You need to include counselling and education too. Always.
Marg
