Posted on 01/27/2002 3:54:24 PM PST by nicholle
The economic downturn reared its ugly head last May when I was laid-off from a dotcom. Living in NYC post-911 has made it even more difficult to find work. I have only been able to secure a lowly test-prep teaching position.
While I spent the latter portion of 2001 wallowing in misery, I have seen the light in 2002: Stop complaining.
So, I decided to couple having no money with self-improvement:
I learned to cook - it saves money and I no longer eat pre-packaged, preservative laden food. Bonus: I feel much better. I eat healthy. I can cook!
I used to buy natural products from Healthy Pleasures or Whole foods. No more. A friend tipped me off to a recipe collection at vanillavelvet.com and I have been whipping up my own bath salts, lip glosses and lotions ever since. It's fun, rewarding, I am using all natural ingredients and I'll never be without an impressive gift for a friend ... "You mean you made this cranberry lip gloss YOURSELF?"
I have become more cultured: I used to spend my free time at the movies, in restaurants or patronizing bars. Not all bad I realize (hey, I did see the Bicycle Thief at the Angelika), but in the past few weeks I have been finding *other* things to do such as visiting Mark Twain's old abode, going to free poetry readings, etc. I feel more fulfilled than I do sitting in front of the tv watching reruns of Friends after a twelve hour day behind a desk.
Anyway, I am feeling so much better with my low-paying test prep job than I was when I was making the bucks in cyberspace.
Has anyone else been able to make the adjustment and come out on top?
I am surrounded by negativity (many of my friends lost their jobs). While I completely understand their position, I am jonesing for some positivity.
Hope everyone is happy and healthy.
Some of my family's favorite meals are those desperation recipes I came up with when we were first married. I love to repair things for myself, find bargains at thrift shops and garage sales, do my own landscaping and yard work, and read books!!
I recommend a series of books by Amy Dacyczyn, The Tightwad Gazette series. Or you can get all three books in one volume. There are tons of helpful hints in those books, as well as an explanation of the philosophy. Also, there are all sorts of web sites devoted to pinching pennies...search under "tightwad" and you will find quite a few.
I hope your job situation improves, but in the meantime, enjoy learning your survival skills. Once you have them, you won't worry so much about how much money you are making!
I love to find bargans in the grocery store (steak can be as cheap as hamburger, if bought on sale); and add up the savings on a note pad monthly. A small habit, but it always suprises me.
I learned to make candles for gifts and found out that people love to have homemade items rather than purchased items.
A little mushy, but it gets the point across:
The Daffodil Principle
Several times my daughter had telephoned to say, "Mother, you must come see the daffodils before they are over." I wanted to go, but it was a two-hour drive from Laguna to Lake Arrowhead. "I will come next Tuesday, " I promised, a little reluctantly, on her third call. Next Tuesday dawned cold and rainy. Still, I had promised, and so I drove there. When I finally walked into Carolyn's house and hugged and greeted my grandchildren, I said, "Forget the daffodils, Carolyn! The road is invisible in the clouds and fog, and there is nothing in the world except you and these children that I want to see bad enough to drive another inch!" My daughter smiled calmly and said, "We drive in this all the time, Mother." "Well, you won't get me back on the road until it clears, and then I'm heading for home!" I assured her. "I was hoping you'd take me over to the garage to pick up my car." "How far will we have to drive?" "Just a few blocks," Carolyn said. "I'll drive. I'm used to this." After several minutes, I had to ask, "Where are we going? This isn't the way to the garage!" "We're going to my garage the long way," Carolyn smiled, "by way of the daffodils." "Carolyn," I said sternly, "please turn around." "It's all right, Mother, I promise. You will never forgive yourself if you miss this experience." After about twenty minutes, we turned onto a small gravel road and I saw a small church.
On the far side of the church, I saw a hand-lettered sign that read, "Daffodil Garden." We got out of the car and each took a child's hand, and I followed Carolyn down the path. Then, we turned a corner of the path, and I looked up and gasped. Before me lay the most glorious sight. It looked as though someone had taken a great vat of gold and poured it down over the mountain peak and slopes. The flowers were planted in majestic, swirling patterns-great ribbons and swaths of deep orange, white, lemon yellow, salmon pink, saffron, and butter yellow. Each different-colored variety was planted as a group so that it swirled and flowed like its own river with its own unique hue. There were five acres of flowers. "But who has done this?" I asked Carolyn. "It's just one woman," Carolyn answered. "She lives on the property. That's her home." Carolyn pointed to a well kept A-frame house that looked small and modest in the midst of all that glory. We walked up to the house.
On the patio, we saw a poster. "Answers to the Questions I Know You Are Asking" was the headline. The first answer was a simple one."50,000 bulbs," it read. The second answer was, "One at a time, by one woman. Two hands, two feet, and very little brain." The third answer was, "Began in 1958." There it was, The Daffodil Principle. For me, that moment was a life-changing experience. I thought of this woman whom I had never met, who, more than forty years before, had begun-one bulb at a time-to bring her vision of beauty and joy to an obscure mountain top.
Still, just planting one bulb at a time, year after year, had changed the world. This unknown woman had forever changed the world in which she lived. She had created something of ineffable (indescribable) magnificence, beauty, and inspiration. The principle her daffodil garden taught is one of the greatest principles of celebration. That is, learning to move toward our goals and desires one step at a time-often just one baby-step at a time-and learning to love the doing, learning to use the accumulation of time. When we multiply tiny pieces of time with small increments of daily effort, we too will find we can accomplish magnificent things. We can change the world. "It makes me sad in a way," I admitted to Carolyn. "What might I have accomplished if I had thought of a wonderful goal thirty-five or forty years ago and had worked away at it 'one bulb at a time' through all those years. Just think what I might have been able to achieve!" My daughter summed up the message of the day in her usual direct way. "Start tomorrow," she said. It's so pointless to think of the lost hours of yesterdays. The way to make learning a lesson of celebration instead of a cause for regret is to only ask, "How can I put this to use today?"... Author Unknown
We convince ourselves that life will be better after we get married, have a baby, then another. Then we are frustrated that the kids aren't old enough and we'll be more content when they are. After that, we're frustrated that we have teenagers to deal with. We will certainly be happy when they are out of that stage. We tell ourselves that our life will be complete when our spouse gets his or her act together, when we get a nicer car, when we are able to go on a nice vacation, or when we retire. The truth is there's no better time to be happy than right now. If not now, when? Your life will always be filled with challenges. It's best to admit this to yourself and decide to be happy anyway. Happiness is the way. So, treasure every moment that you have and treasure it more because you shared it with someone special, special enough to spend your time with... and remember that time waits for no one. So, stop waiting...
Until your car or home is paid off
Until you get a new car or home
Until your kids leave the house
Until you go back to school
Until you finish school
Until you lose 10 lbs.
Until you gain 10 lbs.
Until you get married
Until you get a divorce
Until you have kids
Until you retire
Until summer
Until spring
Until winter
Until fall
Until you die
There is no better time than right now to be happy. Happiness is a journey, not a destination. So work like you don't need money,
Love like you've never been hurt,
And dance like no one's watching.
Having Kraft Mac N' Cheese will get you through times with no money,
But having money will not get you through times with no Kraft Mac N' Cheese.
Good luck to you - it is nice to hear someone take the positive side instead of whining.....!
I have one that is so pathetic that we never even gave it a real name. To this day when I make it we refer to it as 'You know, that stuff'. LOL
when my hubby left the army, unemployment was high, jobs were scarce...I could not work, as I was very ill, mentally from having just lost my son...so my hubby had to go back to school...(there was not a big need for former paratroopers in the civilian job market)...so we lived on unemployment, welfare for a time, and used food banks when we had to and used whatever programs that were available at the time....
We moved into a three room 'shack' as we called it, and made do...we scrimped and saved what we could...we still had another child to raise, and we gave him as much as we could in material things, but it was not much...but what we could not give him in material things, we gave him 100 fold back in love and attention....
Eventually 4 yrs later, the hubby got a good job, we were able live in a bigger place and things got better...eventually we bought our own house, sent our younger boy through college...today, many years later, we are secure, and have no money problems..we are probably better off than many...our son has a great career, and makes way more money than my husband....
But myself, my husband and my son, always remember, with great fondness our 4 yrs so close together in that little 'shack'...we grew closer together, and appreciated the material things so very much more once we could afford them again...My son often says that the way he turned out(Fabulous, according to me, his loving mom) was very much in part because of those 4 difficult years...so I will always be in some part grateful, that I was able to have the experience of being completely dead broke, and yet still was able to love life, and love my family and have faith in the future..
If you aren't religious, try reading the story of Job anyway.
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