Sad stories of financial ruin

This was originally a comment to Karen Hurst's Blog about a tragic circumstanse Of a woman and her mother with some additions.

 I think a big part of these stories is the lack of education, financial education for people out there.  There are so many people who wouldn't own long-term disability insurance or life insurance nor understand it.  Emergency funds, good and bad debts, what plans and strategies will help a specific person reach their financial goals.  I don't see the poverty in Canada that I have seen in the USA but we are sliding there and its sad. 

 I read somewhere that most people spend more time planning there vacations than there financial lives.  I spent 5 years as a financial advisor and left because I realized I didn't have a psychology degree.  My parents used to have this little fuzzy doll that sat on the tank of our basement toilet holding a picket sign that said 'I love people its mankind I hate'. 

It was always facinating to meet people and talk about their financial situation.  People are more alike than you realize.  Attitudes like: Don't look at it cause its too ugly, the problem will go away.  Far too many people were like that.  I got tired of trying to convince people to pay themselves first, 10% if possible, start early start today, Einstien is quoted as saying "compound interest is the 8th wonder of the world" or something like that.  I felt like Jerry Maquire 'help me, help you'.  I was not as successful as I wanted to be helping people.

I decided that 'screw this I'm just going to focus on my own financial independance'.  That lead me into real estate which I truly love and which has given me independance in the fact that I am my own boss and I make a good wage from it; and although I am not at my finishing line I can almost see it from where I'm at:)

People think that it won't happen to them and it is a numbers game.  Its gonna happen to someone, whats your risk.  Stories like that make me run to my finacial planning binder of information and reassess whether I'm on the path I intended to be on.  I suspect most people on this website are not average when it comes to these things, but greater society has a problem and most average people I know are one paycheck away from crisis in their financial lives.  I'm sure everyone has heard that my boss is a double s-o-b backwards

I have also heard that the average person reads one book a year.  What are the chances its a financial book.

Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.
Alice: …so long as I get somewhere.
The Cat: Oh, you're sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.

Where do you want to be?

Someone once asked Lincoln if he only had 8hrs to saw down a tree how would he do it?  He replied that he would spend 7 hrs sharpening the saw and 'ONE' hour cutting the tree.  The problem is too many people are sawing at their trees with dull blades.  You need to stop every once and a while and sharpen!  Maybe when a mentor remindes you to, or when you notice that hey wait a minute here whats that burning smell.  What happened to my teeth?  I used to have all my teeth!

Nobody likes to plan but it is so vital to anything you do.

If you don't make plans for your life and how you want it to unfold chances are someone else has; and what do you think their plans for you look like?

Anyways thats my food for thought today.

Appendix A "No fuzzy humans were harmed in this opinionated rant ;)