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My father being a business man while we were growing up will always tell us how important it is to save money 💰 up for emergencies. And not just emergencies, but how wise we should manage any money that comes our way and not just buying sweets and biscuits as children does.

And then my siblings and I will just laugh 😆 over this issue, asking our father some questions like how can little money for sweets and biscuits grow into something huge. But as a business man he will go on to explain to us how drop of waters turns into an ocean 🌊.

And honestly speaking I never knew this as financial literacy at that tender age, but my siblings and I did took interest in what my father was trying to pass across to us then. This became the first idea to us on how we can save some little money 💰 from the pocket money we receive weekly then.

In fact, I especially started to reduce the number of sweet and biscuits I will buy at school to enable me save some money for the week. And when I went to boarding school 🏫 I was forced to buy a little box 📦 made of wood which is usually constructed by carpenters. This box I will hide in my cupboard and lock it up because I was then always making sure to fold and throw some money in it, and sometimes I will drop some coins 🪙.

This indeed made me so happy because savings became part of my life even after secondary school, that at the end of the year I will break the wooden box 📦 and add the savings to any money 💴 my parents will give to me for Christmas 🎄 shopping 🛍.

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By what I have come to know as financial literacy, it is an ability to understand how to use several financial skills effectively, especially in personal money management, budgeting and investing. This in other words means how we can smartly create a good relationship with money or funds.

Being financially smart enables us to know how we can spend wisely, budget in a way that helps our earnings and can also know on the things to invest on. And apart from the little savings we do while growing up, knowing how to manage money must start from at least the age of 18 years because this is the age that leads to adulthood. Although we can make mistakes like many of us did through not planning properly, but by this age, a person should have the ability to know that spending extravagantly is bad and should think rightly when planing some expenses.

Although most times youths needs the assistance of their parents or guardians to decide for them especially when it involves investing. This is why in most cases funds kept for children by their parents are giving to them from the ages of 20 years and above to avoid mistakes.

Its therefore very important for parents to introduce financial literacy awareness to their children little by little, and maybe from the ages of 15 - 18 to enable them be aware of such a huge and crucial responsibility and ability that concerns money management which is the need to work towards financial security in life.

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And it does not matter if one is rich 🤑 or poor, but this stands as a chance to help the children grow into knowing what challenges a person can face if he or she is totally unaware of what saving, budgeting or investing means to life. They can be carried along gradually in anyway that is not cumbersome nor complicated since it’s a life time process.

This is my response to the #hivelearners featured content for week 167, edition 02, tagged “FINANCIAL LITERACY”.

Thanks for reading friends ❤️❤️.

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