Which do you like better? Sunsets or sunrises? Daylight or moonlight? Summer or winter? Autumn or spring?
Which will you believe? That you’re not thin enough? Or that your body is so heavenly in physical appeal that you take a young man’s breath away? You take my breath away.
What’s one of your favorite things to do with your spare time? See what anyone spends the most time on and you’ll see what they truly treasure.
What would you do when a formerly exceptionally confident peer nominated teen heartthrob finds his tables suddenly turned and he’s at a loss for what to do when he finds he has a heart that will throb only for you?
What is it like to be so attractive, so amazingly beautiful, that when you enter a room all eyes are on you in quiet admiration, sudden anticipation, and ultimate elation?
What is it like to be so important that the earth turns simply because you’re on it?
What is it like to be so influential for good that ensuring your birth happened at just the right time and just the right place in this world was so important in heaven that God made sure it would have the kind of timing that would maximize your chances for discovering your special purpose in life that would prove to give you the opportunity to fulfill your greatest potential?
What is it like to be you? God knows. And because He knows, He has perfect empathy and perfect solutions and perfect blessings just for you. I would like to know what God knows so that I can be more empathetic for you too since I aim for perfect solutions to whatever problems may beset you as I have enjoyed and hope to continue to enjoy the privilege to know and see the perfect blessing that is you.
Happy Valentine’s Day to the best and only Valentine my heart sees.
Love,
Your Secret Admirer
…Only for it to switch places
With the lamb awakening within my own…
[9th anonymous note put in your locker.]
February 17
In case any guy ever pressures you for sex, see if he can pass what I’m calling “The Stump Test.” If you can stump him regarding any of the following information then he either may not be the guy for you or you may want to help him become educated about some important things before you entrust him with your greatest gifts: your chastity (including your heart) and your children that may come from the sexual experience.
There is alot to say about this so that you can have everything you need financially. How do you have all that you need financially? By knowing what I'm about to tell you, what many rich people know but don't always share with others.
This will also help you to recognize which guys will literally make you poor or keep you poor versus those that will care for you in the right ways financially to help you always have the money you need if you marry and stay at home to raise your kids full-time. You'll need to know what it takes to have a husband that earns enough to pay for the needs of your family through an honorable career.
So what “important things” might you see if he can be stumped on (or be educated about if you really like him)? Financial matters that are guaranteed to affect you if you give him what he’s pushing for (sex).
If you’re looking to prove he’s not worth your time, then you’ll want to “stump” him (cause him to look dumb or thoughtless and self-absorbed about the subject of sex) by asking him questions that you know the answers to that he most likely does not.
But if you like him and he proves to not know enough then you can teach him what he needs to know so that if he decides to push you anyway into sex before either of you is truly ready to handle the possible consequences (which consequences are not always possible to control) then he either is a) incredibly selfish (which begs the question of why in the world would you have sex with him in the first place?) or b) incredibly considerate of your needs and ambitious to succeed in fulfilling your needs if he’s planning on making sure both of you have enough money during your married years to provide sufficiently for your family.
So here are some things to consider financially whenever a guy pressures you to have sex.
See if you can tell how much I care about you as you read this. I write this because it's important to me that you have all that you need financially when a guy wants to be with you romantically.
Most families aren’t prepared well enough for any major emergencies. This means that most families in America don’t have a lot in savings. And when people don’t have enough saved then that means that any major financial catastrophe that happens can shove that family into potentially permanent homelessness.
Why don’t most families have enough in savings? Because most people were never taught enough about money or about how much things cost in life. And when people don’t learn these things then they don’t know how to budget and plan their lives financially so that they can be secure financially.
And when people are not secure financially then they are either dependent upon charity or debt or worse – the federal and state government.
(Why is dependence upon government worse? Because only government can force you to do things by showing up with guns and handcuffs when they claim you are breaking one of their laws and because it has been proven over and over that people are nearly guaranteed to remain poor when they use taxpayer dollars for food, housing, medical care etc because government programs specifically use disincentives that provide negative consequences for those that begin to slightly prosper to the point that the only way to rise above needing taxpayer dollars is to earn a much larger amount of income than most people do.
Otherwise, you’ll remain poor precisely because you need any kind of government assistance financially. This has been proven for years but few people talk about it partly because people perpetuate the myth that government can provide “free” stuff but the fact is, nothing is free since someone somewhere must pay for it and absolutely no one is so rich that they can afford to pay for everything for entire towns or cities of Americans.)
When people are dependent upon charity or debt or government they are proving to themselves and others that they are not earning enough to provide for their own needs or for that of their family. So how can people avoid this and be financially secure so that when they get pregnant and need to provide for themselves and their children that they have enough money to never become homeless?
The answer is easy to understand but not as easy to actually do. The answer is that you must know in advance how much things might cost so that you know how much money needs to be set aside or saved to have ready to use for an emergency. Once you know how much emergencies might cost then you factor in taxes, insurance and living expenses and once you add it all up then you’ll have a reasonably good idea for how much you should strive to earn to pay for it all.
So what kinds of emergencies most often happen to people? Which emergencies are the most expensive? Is it possible to get through life without having any financial emergencies?
The only time it’s possible to get through life without experiencing any sudden and unexpected financial needs is for everything to go perfectly in life where you have absolutely no problems whatsoever. Clearly this is not possible. No one’s life is perfect.
If there’s anything you can count on regarding financial emergencies in life, just remember this: it’s not a matter of IF an emergency might happen, it’s a matter of when. (And emergencies happen much more often than people talk about.)
Most people are too embarrassed to have other people find out that they don’t have enough money because most people assume that everyone else is likely better prepared than they are financially when actually the fact is that most people are just as inadequately prepared as their neighbor.
As you consider the most common financial emergencies and the most expensive ones, here is a list to consider budgeting for:
Personal Emergency Preparedness:
Major Medical: Since medical bankruptcy is the most common form of bankruptcy in the U.S., eme
rgency medical needs are clearly the most expensive need for any individual or family to plan for. How much might someone need to have as cash to spend in the event of a sudden, devastating diagnosis to cover out-of-pocket expenses (anything that insurance won’t cover)? You might plan on needing anywhere from $25,000 minimum to over $200,000.
Job Loss: This would be money needed to cover living expenses and other needs while being unemployed and searching for new employment. The amount of time that one might remain unemployed despite diligent job searching efforts can be anywhere from 6 months to over a year. A reasonable amount to plan to save to cover these needs would be a minimum of ten months of expenses.
Property Damage: Major damage to your home could come by termites or a tornado tearing out your garage door or heavy snow breaking your roof or an old pipe busting in your home and causing flood damage along with several other possibilities for major property damage. Minor property damage might be like a small hole in the wall or a clogged toilet or broken window.
These would be problems that you either don’t have insurance coverage for or that your insurance company would deny (meaning to not help you pay for) for any number of reasons.
One of the most common reasons an insurance company denies a claim is because they simply don’t have enough money to fully satisfy everyone’s claims because too many people are asking for their money at the same time – such as when a hundred homes in one town have tornado damage from the same storm and the insurance company knows that the storm is moving to do more damage to more homes in a nearby town so the claims are about to double which is often too expensive for the insurance company.
You might plan on needing anywhere from $5,000 minimum to over $45,000 saved in this category of emergency savings.
Car Repairs: Anything that breaks down on your car for any reason that might not be covered by insurance. Or if you have a high deductible then that would be part of how you would estimate how much savings to have set aside. You might plan on needing anywhere from $500 minimum to over $10,000 saved in this category of emergency savings.
Unexpected Legal: There are too many reasons why someone might sue someone else at any given time here in the United States. If it were me, I might consider saving a minimum of $500,000 just for this category of emergency preparedness.
Income Loss in event of breadwinner’s disability or death (or business income loss or investment income loss): This could be a huge amount because something like this could easily affect things for years if not decades into the future. This could easily be a savings need of six figures or more.
A Loved One’s Unplanned Needs: This could be a sick child or a good friend that needs some money or the possibility of caring for an aging parent that has unexpected needs. I would probably plan a minimum of about $2,000 just for this category.
To add all of it up so far would be a lot of money. But since I like to play things safe, what I would probably do for my family is to plan on earning enough to be able to afford to set aside at least $200,000 for each person in my family. So if I were married with two kids, I would plan on earning enough to be able to save up $800,000 as quickly as possible just for the variety of emergencies that can happen that could affect each of us.
So which is easier to save up that much money as quickly as possible? By picking a job that pays only $20 dollars an hour? Or by choosing a career that pays closer to about $100 an hour or more? The answer is obvious. The more money someone earns either per hour or per month then the easier it is to save enough quickly enough for emergencies.
(And don’t believe anyone that tells you that becoming a stripper or prostitute or porn star will make you a lot of money because that’s a lie. Unless you’re a man, most strippers, porn stars and prostitutes are raped and beaten up by pimps to force the women to give up their money and live completely broke and dependent and controlled by their pimps. The 90’s movie “Pretty Woman” is one of the ugliest myths Hollywood and the porn industry have ever applauded.)
Emergencies come over and over again nearly every year for nearly every individual and family. Some emergencies are minor (somewhat low cost) and others are major (expensive) but nearly all of them are beyond our control.
But something that is within our control is if we get pregnant, how soon and how often and if we keep the baby or give it up in love to a couple that can more easily afford to care for the baby’s childhood needs.
Costs to care for a child is certainly an easy way to stump most guys that would pressure a girl for sex before marriage.
Maybe you could have the guy step into his parent’s shoes for a few minutes to see just how hard it is to provide for a family on a typical American income.
Here’s a typical month for many Americans.
Day 1: The rent (or mortgage) is due. Your dad (and likely your mom too) works to pay that bill so you don’t have to become homeless as a family. It’s at least $800. If it doesn’t get paid then the landlord or bank can call the police and force you to move out TODAY for failure to pay the debt.
If you can’t afford to pay your rent debt, where in the world can you move to on such short notice? Some place safe? Likely not. The cheapest places to live have the highest violent crime rates.
You could go stay in a homeless shelter. Just be prepared for an eye-opening experience. In most shelters there’s no place to store your stuff and so you’re most likely to be mugged by another homeless person in the middle of the night as you sleep out in the open in a room full of cots for beds because that’s how too many homeless people survive is by stealing another person’s stuff to sell later.
So if you want to keep your stuff just make sure you don’t actually sleep when you stay at a shelter because you’ll have to stay awake to try and keep others from stealing your stuff.
Day 3: Utilities and other bills are due. Your parents have to pay for every time you turn on a light switch, every time they turn on a light switch, every time the toilet is flushed or the water is left running in the sink unnecessarily.
They pay for garbage service, sewer service, gas and electricity. For some of your parents this costs another $200 a month – or potentially $400 or more in the summer when the air conditioner is needed – depending upon the size of the home or apartment you live in and the temperature you keep the AC at.
Also both cars need to be filled up with gas. That will cost another $75 or more.
So let’s see where we’re at so far.
$800 + $400 + $75 = $1,275 needed right away.
Your dad just got his paycheck. This happens twice a month. But after paying for any charitable donations he may give to your church as well as paying taxes and any other contributions he pays through his employer for benefits, such as paying to invest in his 401(k) for future retirement, he has very little left over to pay for rent, the above mentioned bills and gas for the family cars.
For many dads they are barely able to cover for these basic financial needs without having to rely on credit cards for help. But still others have more left over – anywhere from $100 to $500 or more.
Day 5: The refrigerator is looking too empty. Food is running low. Mom needs to go to the grocery store. She needs at least $400 to feed her growing family. Another $100 or more is potentially needed for various sanitary items and household cleaning and organizing.
She double checks with the bank to make sure enough money is available for her. If she overcharges her bank card then she’ll have to pay some expensive fees – up to $50 or more. Your family is too poor to be able to afford to pay such expensive penalties.
Thankfully, enough is in the bank. She goes to buy food and other supplies but spends only about $300 this trip. In two weeks she’ll likely spend another $150 for food – NO Restaurants – and likely another $50 or more for other needed items.
So how much has been spent so far of dad’s paycheck:
$1,275 + $300 = $1,575. There’s likely nothing left over from his pa
ycheck.
Day 10: Because mom has a job also she earns money too. This is needed because it’s time for the kids to go back to school and growing kids need more clothing and new school supplies.
Mom and Dad know it will cost at least $600 to handle the back to school needs.
She takes the kids shopping. Let’s see how much has been spent up until now.
$1,575 spent so far this month + $600 for today’s needs = $2,175
Day 14: Mom is running out of diapers for the baby. The baby usually uses about five diapers a day so it’s time to go buy more diapers and wipes. That will cost about $65 to buy. She decides to make the best use of the gas and time and get other needed groceries and supplies from the store.
$2,175 + $265 = $2,440 spent so far in just two weeks.
Day 22: Two kids in this family are involved in extracurricular school activities.
Costs for the two kids to participate in these activities can cost anywhere from $40 up to $200 or more depending upon what activities each child chooses.