Financial Fridays: The Power of a Little

Today’s post is more of an encouragement rather than some “how to” lesson because there are days when we are facing what appears to be an insurmountable task. For some of us, that may be our finances; for others, it could be an academic challenge or something relating to your job. My musing for today is about the need to remember that something little can have big impact.

I was scrolling through my emails this morning when an email from Amazon caught my eye. It was an update on the amount of money Bat World Sanctuary, the charity I had selected for my AmazonSmile donations, has received in the last quarter. It amounted to a little more than $1,800 for the quarter. To date, according to the email, Bat World has received almost $30,000 in donations through the AmazonSmile program.

According to Bat World Sanctuary’s Facebook feed, $800 would feed their fruit bats for about two weeks. As with most non-profits, every little bit helps including the donations my Amazon purchases generates. It such a small thing, selecting a charity and checking out under the smile.amazon.com site rather than plain amazon.com but those small choices I made are multiplied by others making the same small choices and in turn, nets results that make an impact for someone else.

Our family also sponsors a child through Compassion International. It’s less than $50 per month but it still impacts our budget. We had been signed up for a monthly subscription to one of those box services that we enjoyed. The subscription was a wonderful collection of Scottish items and foods (no haggis; that’s best served piping hot and fresh at the pubs) but it was about $50 per month. I had been toying with the idea of canceling it because as much as we enjoyed it, we really didn’t need another coffee mug with the Scottish flag or package of specialty napkins. I think it was my desire for less clutter that spurred us to actually cancel but regardless, we ended up canceling the box subscription about a month before we participated in a Compassion International event at our church.

Fifty dollars seems like a decent amount each month. It’s enough for a nice meal out for two or for four at a cheaper place if you order water for your drinks. It’s a new outfit or a handful of scrapbook supplies. In the grand scheme of things, it is a small drop in the budget bucket. That small drop, when redirected from a monthly subscription box to the sponsorship of a child, is having so much impact on that child’s life. It certainly is having a better impact in her life than the subscription box was doing for us. While $50 is not a HUGE amount in our budget, the impact it has for our sponsored child and her family in another country is significantly more.

I share these two stories because I wanted to show the power of a little. For Bat World, a lot of people choosing them as their charity compounds each person’s little into something impactful for their organization. Those funds from AmazonSmile donations frees up other areas of their budget to help rehabilitate those little pollinators and get them back out in the world to do their job of pollination and eating mosquitoes. This is Texas. There are a lot of mosquitoes that need to be eaten.

With our sponsorship situation, the power of a little is about the perspective. What we think of as a small amount of what we have thanks to two incomes helps a little girl in a much larger way receive extra food and education which will in turn help her family. That $50 becomes a lot for them; it is an investment in their family’s future.

So when you are sitting down to look at your finances and feeling like it is so overwhelming, recall the power of a little. A little change here and there can have great impact over time or from a different perspective. We don’t go from couch potato to marathon runner overnight; our financial journeys follow a similar trajectory. There might be some large changes – like the sale of a boat to pay off your credit cards – but it is the small changes that we commit to and stick with that rework our habits and thus improve the outlook.

Do not discount the power of a little. Over time and with a new perspective, that little can become a lot. Don’t believe me? Do an Internet search for “how to save money” and I bet you’ll find the suggestion of ditching fancy, specialty coffee drinks each day as one way to put a little more back in your wallet. See? The power of a little!

Stay green, my friends!