5 Things you should avoid after you start earning.
It was May 6th,2019, When I started my first job as a software engineer at an MNC, and the same day I made my biggest mistake in life, SIGNING UP FOR A CREDIT CARD.
It’s obvious that you might have dreamt about doing a lot of things once you start earning and there’s nothing wrong in fulfilling each of them and I’ll tell you a way to do that at the end of this article.
1. Don’t get a credit card period
It’s very easy to get into the trap of spending what you don’t have and with a credit card, it’s damn easy to do that. When you first start working/earning, I don’t expect you to have a lot of financial literacy(at least in India), so please don’t signup for a credit card and later regret it. It’ll become much easier to spend more than you earn with your credit card. Once you start earning you’ll get a lot of overconfidence in you and you’ll think like “let’s buy this now and I can pay for it in the coming month”, No it’s not gonna stop next month, It continues.
EMI’s is one of the biggest traps,” We all think like let’s buy this on EMI and paying back 1k bucks every month is not such a big deal”, I’m telling you that’s never gonna stop, you’ll get into lots and lots of EMI’s and at one point you’ll start fearing “What happens if I lose my job? How will I repay all these EMI’s?”.So never get into these EMI, credit cards, buy now, and pay later scams, at least at the start of your career.
If you spend more than you earn, you are not earning.
2. Don’t buy anything that you don’t need.
Once you start getting money into your pockets, everything seems necessary but it’s not. You’ve lived your whole life without that and you can still live(I’m talking about those Apple gadgets, brand new shoes, and those costly weekend trips).
Yes, you deserve some enjoyment but not at the cost of running into debts. If you can’t pay for it with your debit card, don’t go for it. There’s a popular Idea of waiting for a week before you buy anything, Yes after a week you’ll not have the urge of buying it. This is very useful try this.
Never buy those Job guaranteed boot camps and Udemy courses that you are never going to finish. I myself have wasted more than a lakh rupees on those Job guaranteed boot camps and it all went in vain. So don’t do this.
If you really need something wait for a week and after that if you still think you need it buy that with your debit card.
3. Taking Personal Loans
After you start earning, you want to buy every new gadget, go on costly trips, and do many more things for which you don’t have money. At the same time, banks will come with some flashy emails and calls telling you that you are eligible for some personal loan with X amount and with Y interest rate and they’ll convince you to take that since they already know that you need it.
Never, Never, Never take any personal loan. Please don’t do this. You’ll end up paying the EMI’s for your lifetime.
If you need to take a personal loan to buy something, you don’t actually need it.
4. Not Saving
I understand that you’ll not have much knowledge about investing, saving, and all those fancy money-making ideas at this time, but you should at least put some of your earnings aside, just keep them in a separate bank account which doesn’t have an ATM card.
There’s a term called compounding and you’ll love it when linked with money. If you’ve time to learn start learning about investing in stocks, mutual funds, and various other investment options. At this age, you’ll have nothing to lose and so you can take some risk. Try to save some amount every month and either save it or invest it somewhere.
A penny saved is a penny earned.
5. Not learning new skills
Once we start earning, we’ll never consider the importance of learning things.
Never stop learning, try to invest in some good courses and improve your skills. Don’t get into the comfort zone of working 5 days a week and waiting for weekends to have fun. Never do this. Start some side hustle, learn a new skill or improve the current skill you have.
Your growth stops the day you stop learning.
Summary
Try to avoid going into the trap of debt, EMI’s, credit cards, and personal loans, and start investing and learning new things.
Invest in yourself and you’ll never regret it.
