When you have exhausted all possibilities, remember this - you haven't.

_{My title is a quote by Thomas Edison. It's one of my favorite quotes}

Desperation makes people do a lot of things. Poverty (or whatever you like to call it) happens to be one of the strongest forces that drive people into desperation, and this desperation leads to hopelessness. In this moment of vulnerability, loan sharks promise to be your friend. But if I could give people one financial advice (I can’t) and it would be guaranteed that they’d take it, it would be to stay away from loans.

In the general sense of the word, loans include all sorts of money taken with intentions of paying back later with interests, whether it’s from a friend or an organization whose business model is lending and collecting money with interests. The latter is especially what I strongly advise people to stay away from. Friends are family might empathize with your circumstances, but loan organizations won’t, because after all everyone that comes to them has a sob story to tell and they would go bankrupt if they started letting people off out of pity. Of course, there can be circumstances that leave with you no choice than to take loans, but even in those circumstances, I guarantee you, you haven’t exhausted all your options.

The problem with loan-taking is the paying back part. _{Did I mention the stupid interests?} Money is an enigmatic concept. No one, not you or the organization you’re collecting it from, wants to part with it because at any given moment, there’s so much you can do with it. With the uncertainty of the future, people take loans expecting to pay them back with money from sources they’re hopeful will come through, only to experience dilemmas when either these sources bounce, or when other equally more important things come up after receiving the money that it becomes extremely difficult for them to prioritize paying back money they’ve already spent against using it for that pressing need. This is usually why loan sharks harass many people – it’s not that they don’t have the money, but the money is budgeted towards something different that to them, is more of a priority to them.

For the longest time since university, I have been a frequent collector of MTN Quick Loan. I’ve faced the dilemma I just described above several times, and that has over the years, taught me that I’m better of suffering than collecting money I’ll struggle paying back later. Somewhere at the start of last year, I contemplated taking a huge loan to buy crypto so that I could take advantage of the bear market. But I did some analysis and evaluation of the risk in the case that we were still in the bear by the time I had to pay back and realized I would fumble with paying the loan back with the outrageous interest the loan shark was suggesting. Looking at it in retrospect, I am glad I didn’t take it, cos I would’ve been fucked in several different ways if I did.

Over the past year, I take my advice and I stay away from loans as much as humanly possible. Like I said though, some circumstances warrant them, and when I find myself in those circumstances, I go to my friends and family. My sister is my biggest supporter and I don’t hesitate to ask her for help when I need something I know she has. It took a long time and some very unpleasant life events for me to build that sort of relationship with her, but even though I’d rather not have had those life events happen, I’m glad that it’s built us into siblings who come through for each other.

In cases when I can’t rely on her, I have a network of 3 friends who I have an unspoken rule of riding all out for. A phone call or text normally is all it takes to get them to wire money. No reasons, no explanations, they just send it. I do the same for them. I’m honestly not sure how we built this trust and support for each other, but I’ll tell you, it feels great to know that I have people like this. People have hundreds of contacts on their phones and not a single person of this sort to call out to when things get hard.

Rather than taking loans, this is what I implore you to build – friends and family you support and who support you. From these people, you’re not taking loans, but simply getting support at the time you need it. Keep in mind though that you have to give what you want from others, expecting nothing in return to get it from them when it’s your turn.

This is a bit deviant from the HL Prompt for this week, but my idea of a good loan is a loan never taken. 🙂

Posted Using InLeo Alpha