The Importance of Budgeting

The Importance of Budgeting

Budgeting plays an integral role in reducing financial stress. It creates a spending plan for any household’s money and helps to ensure there are provisions made for necessities such as food and bills.

Additionally, it allows control over money, keeps people focused on financial goals, and prevents unnecessary debt. People like Alexander Djerassi understand that budgeting is an economic lesson that cannot be overstated. The concepts go hand in hand as it relates to money management. Below are the reasons why a budget is vital in saving money and reducing stress.

 A Budget Helps Prevent Overspending

With the advent of credit cards, people don’t know they are in debt until they are adversely affected in some way. Because of this plastic era’s somewhat limitless nature, people tend to spend outside of their means and end up overextending themselves financially. An inability to repay credit card bills or other overspending methods results in stress and improper money management. However, if a budget is created and adhered to, this problem does not necessarily arise. A budget makes one aware of earnings, how much can be spent, and how much should be saved. As a result, it creates a hyper awareness of limits that should be stuck to and thus, prevents overspending.

 Budgets Help Prepare for Emergencies

Life tends to throw unexpected happenings in peoples’ daily lives no matter how many contingencies they have. Whether it is an injury or illness; death, unemployment, or divorce, they can result in financial serious upheaval. The stress and mental instability that usually accompany these times can be alleviated by a budget. It normally has an emergency fund that consists of at least three to six months’ living expenses. This extra money can bridge financial gaps and ensure that debt does not occur during these times. It’s best not to dump the majority of monthly income into an emergency fund. Build it into the budget, set realistic goals, and start small. The fund will eventually build up.

 Budgeting Helps Create Financial Contentment

When using a budget, one gets to have absolute control over money. It enables the ability to plan regarding money management rather than a mindless spending spree. When money is organized and protected correctly, it will grow and stay safe. As a result, it is of paramount importance to manage money through a budget to ensure that the best is gotten from it. Once this is actualized, people have access to financial contentment that sees people making provisions for their financial futures and taking care of their present-day spending. People become stable and can save huge amounts of money as well as reduce the stress associated with money management.

In short, Alexander Djerassi thinks that budgeting is a continuous process that allows those who practice it access to money management skills that reward their lives from the get-go. It is best to start small. Budget on a monthly basis and then work up to a yearly budget. Remember that they should not be stagnant either. The process requires a revision and improvement of budgets so it can fit peoples’ monetary needs.

Importance of Giving Back

Importance of Giving Back

Robert Ingersoll said “We rise by lifting others”. A community can benefit from good people that make it their life mission to set aside their own wants and desires just to uplift others. Shalom Lamm is a great example of someone who could have just gone to college, built a career and left it at that. Yet, it was the Jewish whose call he answered. A call from beyond the grave and through the tears of their families.

Shalom Lamm’s Heart for Community

Lamm earned a degree in Philosophy from Yeshiva University in New York City and from there established a career in real estate. Later, he earned a Masters in U.S. Military History at American Military University in Virginia.

He was touched by Jewish families who lost loved ones in WWII and were never properly buried. Out of this tragedy, Operation Benjamin was born. Operation Benjamin “ensures that the fallen heroes are buried under the Star of David.” The non-profit organization has been running successfully and there is no cost to the families that it helps.

Operation Benjamin

Jewish burial under the Star of David is crucial to Jewish faith. Jewish soldiers that have fallen were never given their proper burial. 

For generations, Jewish families had to sit with the sad fact that their loved ones were incorrectly buried. Operation Benjamin, through accurate and sharp genealogical research, have succeeded in changing the grave markers of all Jewish soldiers buried under crosses “but there could be hundreds more.”

Operation Benjamin is not the only volunteering Lamm is doing. He and his wife Tina “created an initiative” that delivered thousands of nonperishables to Jewish communities in Kiev and during the pandemic of 2020, he urged safety first because of the coronavirus claiming lives and the importance of still having museums available for educating the masses.

Giving back may not be wildly popular but it yields benefits for humanity and Lamm understands this. Others like Lamm understand this concept as well. When a community suffers and has no answers, sometimes it is one person who has the idea to give back, whether it is food or help for paying others’ rent. It will spark a warm kindness in their hearts. It doesn’t take much. Kindness can begin with one person handing out canned goods or helping single parents. It can inspire a nation.

Lamm is one of many examples of the “quiet hero” But anyone could be if they see the value in the act of kindness, and he may not want others to sing praises of him, but just the act of giving back will never go unnoticed by those who are helped.