Ivy says:

In case you have been living under a rock, prices are going up and wages are staying the same or going down. I’ve read so many newspaper articles announcing this, that I could use those articles to wallpaper my entire house, and I would still have enough to use for (very, very scratchy) toilet paper.

I read something today about how Gen Xers have a worse standard of living than our parents did when they were our age. Okay, I get that. But we have something our parents did not- the internet. So, if you ask me, the internet addict, whether our lives are better or worse than our parents’ lives, I’d say it’s better.

It’s easy to fall into the “the sky is falling” trap when our media is constantly telling us that the sky is, indeed, falling. I personally have felt that quite a bit, but something has occurred to me. There’s nothing I can do to change it. All I can do is be proactive and arrange my family’s finances to make sure that when and if the sky does fall, we’ll hopefully be okay.

So we’re making the best of what we’ve got. We’re buckling down and taking care of ourselves while at the same time, doing what we can to help other people. My uncle, who lives on disability and has a ridiculously tight budget, said the other day that his bathroom scales broke. I thought about how I have an extra set of  bathroom scales from when I replaced my old analog scale and bought a set of digital scales. Did I really need two? I gave him my old one.

What can you do to help yourself, and others? I ask that of myself every day. Even the poorest of us have something worth giving. So do the richest of us. Stop worrying about the economy. Stop worrying about things you cannot change. Make the change in yourself, and reap the rewards.