It’s true that money can help you feel safe and secure. If you were overseas and you had to get back home quickly, you’d need money in a hurry. If you unexpectedly lost your income – you’d still need to pay your bills while you found another job to get back on your feet.

It’s also true that money can improve your level of comfort in life, but it can’t prevent tragedies or insure you against uncertainty. Neither can money buy love, happiness or wisdom. There’s an old Jewish proverb that says, ‘Of what use is money in the hand of a fool since he has no desire to get wisdom?’ In this proverb, the ‘fool’ is a person who doesn’t have financial understanding or a desire to get any.

Fred Smith Snr, the father of the multi-billionaire founder of Fedex, has an excellent philosophy: ‘Money will never give you security, yet there is a certain amount of money that makes each of us feel secure. Determine how much that is, develop a strategy to get it and get cracking. Once achieved, stop striving! Otherwise you will fall into the false belief that you’ll be secure or happy when you have just a little bit more!’

Read more in the book; Making It on My Own; 52 Smart Ways to Smash It in the Real World.