Resumo de Wealth Within Your Reach: Pera Mo Palaguin Mo!

        Being in the Army for the past nine
years has exposed me to all manners of soldiers and the culture that pervaded
its consciousness, both good and bad.
But there is none more eminent than what I call the ?debt culture? among
soldiers in all ranks. Almost all
personnel have loan deductions in their pay-and-allowance slips. Some have outstanding debts in their unit
cooperative stores that, more often than not, go bankrupt due to this problem.

                     Having read the book of Mr. Colayco,
I realized the points he expressed in it are relevant to all kinds of people
who are earning a living. Though he
wrote it with Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) in mind, it is also applicable to
people like us who think we are barely making ends meet, but, actually, the
real problem lies in mismanagement of our earnings and lack of financial
planning.

                    The book gives us a background on
how important it is to understand personal finance (i.e., how we manage our
salaries/earnings). It emphasizes that
anyone, even the below-average earner, can achieve finance independence and
financial freedom, that Mr. Colayco aptly terms ?kalayaan sa kakapusan? in the vernacular.        He states that to achieve financial
independence, we must first overcome the obstacles to financial freedom. One obstacle that is common among us is our
?poor spending habits.?   We often have
this tendency for instant gratification.
For example, if a new model of a cell phone just came out in the market,
we often splurge on that one item without much contemplation. Time comes when we need money for enrollment
of the children, or other emergency situation, we have no savings to spend for
it and the obvious option for the typical Filipino soldier is to apply for a
loan. Another important obstacle is
inflation. At present, our inflation
rate is at a whopping 7-8% as compared to the past year?s 5%. The cost of basic needs and services are
rising but our earnings do not.

                What do we do about it? How do we escape the option of applying for a
loan every time we need money? I, for
one, loathe to loan for the simple reason that these lending institutions
charge a high interest rate. What do we
do when our budgets often fall short?
The book enumerates the answers in the chapters called ?Commandments for
Financial Freedom.?
      I recommend all wage earners to read
this book. After reading it, I have this
feeling of being more optimistic of the future.
Having also applied some practices endorsed in the book like making a
monthly list of expenses, I realize that I have been spending my money on
things I can do without and that I can even set aside some of it for my
children?s education, an emergency fund and even a fund for our future house
and lot!     The book also emphasizes the
importance of planning for our retirement by saving NOW and putting our savings
in investments earning more than the inflation rate. It also extols the virtues of determination,
discipline and decisiveness, as they are the KEYS to one?s financial success or
failure.
     Reading this book has changed my
view that I am earning only so much to make ends meet. ?Wealth is merely having the resources to
fund ones needs at any given time,? says the book and anybody can achieve this. The book is also easy to read, having a
wealth of interesting stories and anecdotes about people who were ?scammed? by pyramidingschemes, who earned big money but became bankrupt, who invested well and those
who eventually learned from their mistakes and rose again to become a
success. Some quotes are even in the
vernacular (Tagalog) so the seemingly
complicated concepts on finance become understandable.    Through this book, we can educate
ourselves and our men on the merits of financial planning towards a better
future for our families. This is the
pertinent message and the aim of the book ? for all to know that financial
independence is within anyone?s reach.

A quote from the book reads ?If, today, you are able
to generate income, you have the capital and you can grow it! But you must act
NOW!? It is with this urgency that I
impel you to read the book and you will not regret it.

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