Today has been a very interesting Monday! My day started off at six o’clock in the morning – I went out to my car, which is what they would call a classic car or an old vehicle, and I haven’t driven it or really turned it over with the key in about a week, so obviously, to be expected – my car battery was dead. This wasn’t too big of a problem because my wife has a car, and she allowed me to use that since we’re both working on a hybrid schedule. She was at home today and I was scheduled to be in the office. I get in the car and pull down the driveway, and as I’m pulling out of our driveway onto the main road, the car just loses momentum.

The gas pedal was not responding, so I just ended up pulling over about half a mile away from my home. I had to call a family member to come pick me up and let me borrow their car which was a blessing because it’s always good to have people you can reach out to and when people have your back. So long story short, now both cars are down and while we are using a loaner car, we’re calling around to all these mechanic shops trying to figure out what’s going to happen. It was just chaos, and in the thick of all that, I remembered that I still had to call my boss and explain the situation. It was a funny text message that I sent him because if he didn’t know me, and if I wasn’t such a good worker, it would seem like I was lying that both of my cars stopped working on the same day.

I let him know that I couldn’t come into the office, but I would be working from home. After a two-day weekend and your employee doesn’t want to come to work, it sounds like, you know, maybe I was out partying, maybe I had too much fun watching the football game last night, but my boss was cool about it. The car is still in the shop, and we still haven’t really heard how much it’s going to cost or still haven’t really talked to my family members to figure out when I’m going to return to their vehicle. I’m really blessed, and I generally love Mondays. The reason why I love Mondays is because that’s when the stock market opens and I wait all weekend for the stock market to open see what happened, especially if we ended on a down note and had a down day at the end of the week.

This Monday started off a little bit rough, but when the stock market opened, all my stocks were up and all the investments that I made while the market was down in the last couple of weeks were doing well, the bounce back was real.It was a Monday, but that’s what I expect for Monday – to start my week off with something fun and exciting.I did get to do some work from my office, I attended some Zoom calls, and overall, I had a great day, I can’t complain. But this reminded me that if this had happened to me two or maybe three years ago, it wouldn’t have been a happy Monday. This would have been a miserable Monday, because two years ago I didn’t have my own home, I didn’t have long-term savings, and I didn’t have short-term savings.

I did an episode on strategic short-term savings on my podcast, which you can find atwww.pocketchange.investments . Anyway, I did an episode on $500 emergencies about a year ago and I did an episode on strategic short-term savings. After I recorded those articles, I didn’t want to be a hypocrite, so I started saving my money, building up my short-term savings and ended up keeping a reserve of at least $500 in my savings account. So, when all of this happened, I didn’t panic, I didn’t worry, especially since I had a network of people that I could call. But, if I had to pay for a tow truck on the spot or if I had to pay an auto repair bill right then and there, I am and I was totally prepared for anything that could have happened. T

hat’s really a blessing for me, especially because two years ago, this would have been something that really ruined my day, it probably would have ruined my finances, and it more than likely would have stressed me beyond all means even before we got to the whole spending money part of the equation because I knew that some money would have to be spent and that I would miss time off from work.Fortunately, I’m working full-time now so I no longer worry about missing time for work because I have a little bit of PTO, which is awesome.

I’m not saying any of this to humble brag or anything, I’m just really saying that I love Mondays, and I’m feeling really blessed right now. Part of growing up is adapting to the world you live in, and not being stressed out by the things that happen to you and adapting to whatever struggle you’re in and making that struggle irrelevant. Although I’m still in the struggle and although I’m not rich, I feel like today was a testament to what happens when you prepare and when you do some hard work. Sometimes when you’re saving or budgeting, it feels like you’re depriving yourself, but today was just a testament to all the hard work and all that sacrifice that I put in over these last two years.After this happened, I had a home to go back to and I had a family member who felt comfortable with loaning me their car. I

t’s just a blessing to be a responsible adult and for other people to see you as a responsible adult even when things happen that are out of your control. There’s a Christians bible verse that “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference”, and right now I just really appreciate my progress and being able to not panic when things happen because if this same exact situation would have happened a couple of years ago, I would have been renting, I would have been living check to check, and I really would have been in a bad situation. Yes, I still would have had family who would have gone out on a limb for me to pick me up and allow me to use one of their vehicles, but like I said I’m just feeling really blessed and I wanted to share that with everybody.

I like to talk about finance, and I like to talk about preparation, but it is not very often that I get to talk about finances in your everyday life and finance that happens in the moment. As I said before, I’ve done episodes on budgeting and short-term saving, and now I’m working on a long-term savings episode, but it really shows you a little bit of the fruits of your labor when you’re able to see the changes in your life that saving, and budgeting has made. So, I’m going to end that right here. I wanted to share the story and let you know why I’m so happy and upbeat today – my stocks are doing well, my savings are still in my bank and if I must use it on the car, it’s not going to destroy my life, it’s not going to be the reason why I’m late on the mortgage or cable bill.

Reflection

At this point in my life, I’m prepared for all the $500 emergencies, I have savings, I have available credit, and it’s just a complete change when you prepare for things like that, it can really change your outlook on life and how you deal with things.  Thank you for listening and I hope you’re having a great Monday, and I really wish you the best. If you have any questions or comments, I’m available on Facebook, YouTube, Google, hit me up. I love to talk finance, we do finance every day and I want you to share your stories with me and things that happen in your life, not humble brags and not complaining, but I want you to share your stories of personal growth, financial education, and financial literacy and how that helped change your outlook on life or just your personal situation.

My name is Basheer, I am @PocketPodcast on Twitter, @Arbitrage on Public, my website is www.pocketchange.investments and I am the Pocket Change Investments on Facebook and Instagram. Thank you very much! Have a great day and a happy Monday!