Like most people, once I’ve read a blog entry, I often don’t go back to it to see the comments unless I have commented myself, which means that some of you may have missed the great comment that Abigail made on yesterday’s post. I liked it so much I’m going to reprint it here.
At 28, I say you need to try doing what you love. Soon enough, you’ll find yourself in a life that you’re afraid to endanger. You’ll put it off because you’re saving for a wedding or kids or whatever. Do it now. I say take the job even if they don’t offer you quite what you want. If it’s a fulfilling job, it’s worth a little scraping.
My husband’s health has prevented him from working for awhile. We actually had to move to Arizona to get his health back to a reasonable level. Now, he’s looking at some part-time work (I want him to ease back in, since stress can exacerbate his condition). But once he’s sure he can work sustainably, he’s going to start applying to work with the developmentally disabled. He will be starting out at the absolute bottom rung — around $8 an hour. Things will be hard. But I’d rather see him happy and fulfilled in his job, than working a job he hates to maintain a more materialistic lifestyle.
Yes, we want to start a family once we’re out of debt. But we can still attain those goals, so long as we’re careful with money. And he may, eventually, get a better paying position. (Some of the facilities will give you help with tuition to get a work-related degree.) But if he doesn’t, oh well.
I’m, by nature, a very cautious, risk-averse person. But you only get one chance at this whole “life” thing. (Or, at least, that we remember, which amounts to the same thing.) So try it. The worst case scenario is that it doesn’t work out and after a year or so you start looking for higher-paying jobs like the one you’re in now. If you don’t try now, you’ll always wonder what if.
So my advice is not just to go after this job, but to start (or keep?) actively looking for jobs like it. People find they can adjust to a life with less money; but it’s a lot harder to adjust to a life without happiness or fulfillment.
Now maybe it’s because it’s what I’m hoping to hear, but I really liked this comment. It helps to put things into perspective. And now that you’ve finished reading, go check out Abigail’s blog!
Megan is a 40-something government employee in the Washington, DC area. She got interested in Personal Finance when she got out of college and realized that her paycheck wasn’t going to go as far as she had hoped. Since starting this blog, she has managed to buy a house and make a solid start on her retirement goals, and hopes to help others do the same. Here is her story:
In 2007, I was a gainfully employed 20-something with no debt but not a lot of knowledge about personal finance. It was a co-worker’s comment about Roth IRAs that sent me to the internet, searching for information. It was then that I realized that I really didn’t know a whole lot about personal finance and that my current financial situation was due a lot to inherent frugal tendencies, generous family members, a fear of debt, and good luck. While that was working for me, clearly I needed a better plan.
While I had no debt, I was also pretty much living paycheck to paycheck and not worrying about going over budget (I say this as if I had a real budget) because I had an emergency fund set aside to cover any overages.
Except that’s not what an emergency fund is for.
So I did a lot of research, read a lot of blogs, and decided that I needed a plan. I needed to budget. I needed to know what I was spending my money on. I needed to prepare for the future.
I decided to create a blog not only to make myself accountable to others but also to share the knowledge that I gained along the way. I’ve learned so much from my fellow bloggers, and I hope that my readers can find something useful in what I have to share as well.
