Kids are cool to have whether you have money or not. Well, if you decide to have kids, anyway, and are responsible for the act of raising a family, either poor or rich or somewhere in between, then its great whether you're saving for your first million or not saving at all .. no amount of money will ever buy the pure joy of raising ones family and watching the growth daily, hand in hand. Its something all humans have the potential to have in common with each other. Life is a struggle, even for the rich.
Debt is definitely the first thing to avoid.
I've made my riches, modestly, by working hard. Hard work, being paid to do things you like to do, having a strong investment in the tools one needs to work hard, then getting on with it. By work, I mean, 'do something that someone else needs done, well'.
Also: get paid. The world is a big, wild, woolly place, and if someone is going to pay you well to haul bricks all day, get out there and haul bricks, to get PAID. Doing a good job means also, getting paid well. Because the person you are working for wants to pay you well, and for little other reason than that your hard work is valuable to them.
This is the nature of the realms in which money, our subject today, becomes of any use: someone else thinks its worth it to do/make BLAH, even if you personally don't.
Kids are cool to have? Nah, I have too much emotional burden to even become a father figure. It is a lot of responsibility, and I bet the joy of having kids is priceless. Cool? not so much.
If it makes you feel better, it's not so joyous most of the time and the coolness comes in measured doses.
Imagine for the millionth time that day, you're yelling at your older kid to do his chores, feed his pets, practice his instrument, do his homework, etc. Or the younger one smells like ass and he's having a meltdown because you want to change his diaper and he'd rather keep playing
I swear, some days I come home and feel like turning around and heading off back to work. So, no, it's not all wine and roses.
But then they do something that shows you're at least semi-competent at raising them and it makes your day.
Debt is definitely the first thing to avoid.
I've made my riches, modestly, by working hard. Hard work, being paid to do things you like to do, having a strong investment in the tools one needs to work hard, then getting on with it. By work, I mean, 'do something that someone else needs done, well'.
Also: get paid. The world is a big, wild, woolly place, and if someone is going to pay you well to haul bricks all day, get out there and haul bricks, to get PAID. Doing a good job means also, getting paid well. Because the person you are working for wants to pay you well, and for little other reason than that your hard work is valuable to them.
This is the nature of the realms in which money, our subject today, becomes of any use: someone else thinks its worth it to do/make BLAH, even if you personally don't.