Over the years many readers asked me, why I named the blog One Cent at a Time.
After reaching the USA as immigrants, for many years, I used to follow a personal finance blog named – Get Rich slowly. That blog still exists. Although it had lost the charm (my opinion).
The idea was ingrained in my mind about achieving your goals slowly and steadily.
Like – One step at a time.
When it comes to finances, One Cent at a Time, was the perfect resonance of my state of mind.
Luckily in 2011, that type of domain name was still available.
As a human being, we improve every day, we become richer (in knowledge, in wealth and in our consciences) one process, one thought, one cent at a time.
When the earth was forming, little droplets of water from meteors and asteroids formed the vast oceans.
Similarly, I believe small cents will combine one day into big wealth for all of us. and we become richer.
Get rich One Cent at a Time
Only the lucky ones become overnight rich, rest, like most of us, takes time, in most cases, it takes decades to become rich.
The ‘rich’ is a relative term, perhaps if I return back to India, I’ll be considered a rich guy, as the cost of living there is still low. But, I am not a rich person here in the USA.
I still can’t afford to buy every logical thing that my son asks for.
Forget about money, even as a person people can be rich and richer. In terms of other intrinsic characteristics.
I person without a penny can be immensely rich spiritually, mentally, and emotionally.
There might be someone who earns less than what I earn or have less net worth than I do, yet, he/she might feel himself/herself a rich person.
In a sense, rich is a relative term.
And, in this blog, we become richer in every aspect of life, not just monetarily.
With that concept of rich being a relative term, let me give you more perspective on it, do you know Polymorphism (fellow software engineers might understand better)?
A rich can be rich monetarily, emotionally, spiritually, and socially. These are different ploy-morphs of being rich.
- You can live frugally and become monetarily richer.
- By going to church, mosque, temple, pagodas, gurudwaras you may feel spiritually richer.
- You can grow your friend circle and become emotionally and socially richer.
There are alternate ways –
You can become emotionally richer by buying expensive items too.
You can even borrow money on credit cards and buy luxury items.
But will that make you monetarily richer?
There is a very important and mandatory relationship between these polymorphs.
Another example;
If your family wants to have an experience of a big-screen movie theater, does Netflix give you a satisfaction of saving on the ticket cost rather than seeing their happy faces in the movie hall?
For my family, I will rather see them in the movie hall.
A balance is needed to be maintained in the way you live your day-to-day life, while you are on course of becoming rich.
Being rich also depends on how rich you want to be.
My grandfather was rich in his sense that he never had to borrow money and left a decent sum of money for his sons. He always said, “I am rich”.
If you have less ambition you can be rich fairly quickly than others. I can go into a remote Indian village, buy vast land, and build a big house.
People around me will call me a mega-rich. In that sense, I am already rich.
The priest you admire most, isn’t he rich?
Most certainly he is, he has a relatively lower demand for materials and at the same time has high-level spirituality. He is spiritually, emotionally, and socially rich.
I do feel enriched by giving away my money for causes and charity.
Recently I became more emotionally richer and felt my salary just doubled when I started remitting money to my parents back in India.
Philosophy of Get rich slowly (my favorite blog and blogging mentor) is, you need time to grow richer.
One Cent At A Time also has the same philosophy, the word cent doesn’t mean only money, it means value.
This blog is not about becoming rich monetarily alone. It has all the aspects and polymorphs of the word rich.
Being rich is not about making more money, it is about finding what you want.
One Cent At A Time is my journey towards being rich by finding what I want.
My blog is in pursuit of happiness for my readers and me that too for life long. No happiness is real happiness unless it’s long-lived.
As I keep on writing this blog, every day my knowledge is growing and which, in turn, makes me emotionally richer.
Be happy one cent at a time, be rich one cent at a time, be social one cent at a time be spirited one cent at a time.
The journey started, it will continue till I feel richer in its full meaning and senses and so do you, my faithful readers.
Let me ask you..if you have tons of money in the bank, you have enough power and influence in the society you live in, would you feel richer? Please leave comments.
Nice sentiments, OCAAT.
thank you!
you are very correct, please keep this up, it has greatly encouraged me, i am already on the way to getting rich in all ways, mostly to get the basic needs of life and peace of mind. thank you anyway.
thanks for commenting on a post which I like most, but sadly it failed to catch enough attention. Comments I received on this post a way less than what I received on other posts. Thanks for your time.
We all can be rich easily if we lower our monetary richness expectation. If you can be satisfied with less you can feel richer easily. Other aspects of richness really depends on your peace of mind and ability to help the society.
Nice post! I agree that there are different ways to be “rich.” It depends on your personality as much as anything. If you can be happy with less and are content to live a happy life, then you don’t need a huge amount of money.