WHY I LOVE FREE STUFF :)

 


They scream at you from all sides. Those 'FREE' signs. They psyche you into thinking you are a victor when you could easily become the victim. Buy _____Get ____ FREE. That's the tagline I love the most. 


And now there's a mutant. Online shoppers, beware! Its called BUY MORE, SAVE MORE! Under this bait, you are compelled to see if you 'need' another item in their shop and add it to your purchases and they will give the incentive. Normally its cashback so you can only use it to buy MORE STUFF later on. 

I think its necessary to be aware that whenever you are purchasing a food item for example, that you check the UNIT PRICE. And to check all dealers selling the product and compare unit prices before you ADD TO CART. 

Whenever I went to Big Bazaar, I would always compare the price for a particular item, say Liril Soap, with the price on Amazon and only if the unit price was cheaper or the same at Big Bazaar, then I would purchase it. Btw, BB usually lost on this score. 

 Another pitfall I fall for is FREE SHIPPING. I even subscribed to AMAZON PRIME one year till I realized that I was paying more money than I normally would. Amazon Pantry has a ceiling of Rs 799, some items a ceiling of Rs 499 to avail this so it puts pressure on you to buy more than you need at that moment. For example, recently, I added a packet of Saffola oats (which I didn't need urgently as I had already purchased just a week before) to the Pantry items just to cross the ceiling and get FREE SHIPPING. 


Another online bait are all those REWARD schemes they throw at you like darts. Every month we recharge our mobile net using the offer and get some cashback. And quite often they slip in the clincher. The 'Buy Rs. 500 worth of goods and get Rs 50 cashback' one. And they give you a ridiculously small window to do the purchase. I fall for this one every time. 


Nowadays, I line up my items beforehand in SAVE FOR LATER - I'm too lazy to add to WISHLIST. I then will check unit prices and 'Add To Cart' only if its worth the price. Rarely, but miraculously, there will also be a discount coupon. That makes me smile! 

 



Last year, I decided not to shop online so I only did my recharge and paid my electricity bill using UPI. They gave me cashback for each transaction which I accumulated. Since we were in lockdown and Big Bazaar was shut, I couldn't use my debit card reward points so I decided to redeem them online. The wearables were horribly priced but there was just one ray of hope. The AMAZON PAY Gift Card. Hurrah! I had found the perfect way to redeem my points. Now I could add this money to my Amazon Pay balance and use it for anything I needed including paying for my recharge and bill. Did I use it? NO. 

Look at the devious nature of the schemes, friends. If you want cashback, you have to use Amazon Pay UPI. They want you to use the UPI portal. It stands to reason that they must be getting a lot of benefits from us using it while we get the peanuts they throw at us in the form of CASHBACK. 

Why do we have this FREE mentality, I ask myself. The answer is really simple. Because we are all TAKERS by nature. We love exploiting systems. We delight in making a fast buck, striking a great deal. That is why our countrymen endorse bribery. We haggle because we LOVE to haggle. Its a sport with us Indians. We will sometimes walk a mile just to get something a little cheaper. 

But more often than not we get scammed. Sometimes horribly. I have watched videos of testimonials where people have been royally ripped off by conmen using online pay portals like Google Pay, etc.  

So, it seems prudent to FREE ourselves from this mentality and become GIVERS instead. How can we become givers?

By practising GENEROSITY daily. Yes, DAILY. A vlog I watched recently was presented by a man who had become a monk for two months to train his mind to lead a simple lifestyle. Among his many videos, he gave a simple alternative to GREED. He advocated the practice of generosity. I will link that video below. 

So practising daily GIVING is not easy but it is life-changing if you do it. Whom can I be generous towards? And with what? 

Do watch the video and answer these two questions for yourself. FREE yourself from covetousness and greed. And do pray for me to do the same. SHALOM. 

https://youtu.be/G1VNPLLDbbY



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

WRAPPED IN RUBBISH.

Image
 Look at these two items. Both are oats but are priced differently. The obvious choice, if you are not brand conscious, will be to purchase the lower priced one in terms of unit price. The Lion oats, however, has a ziploc bag packaging so it can be reused whereas to reuse the Saffola oats one we might need to use a clip or rubber band.  Now look at the item below.  What do you think about the packaging? Reusable. Recyclable? If they were all priced the same and you were not brand conscious or you knew all three were of the same quality, which one would you prefer to purchase? Think about it and leave your answer in the comments below.  With supermarkets springing up at every corner and online shopping taking the world by storm, it was inevitable that packaging had to become the number one concern of manufacturers.  How do I get my goods to the customer safely so he is satisfied? When he sees it, he should feel that he is getting a product that is not contaminated. So packaging evolved
Read more

How to Upgrade Your Lifestyle Without Spending an Extra Penny

Image
How to Upgrade Your Lifestyle Without Spending an Extra Penny by Joshua Becker Fifteen years ago, in Vermont, I discovered minimalism. While cleaning a garage full of clutter, my neighbor changed my life with a couple of sentences. She said, “That’s why my daughter is a minimalist. She keeps telling me I don’t need to own all this stuff.” The scene that played out in front of me changed my life. My garage, full of dirty clutter, had taken up hours of my morning, while my 5-year old son played alone on the swing-set in the backyard. I realized the need for change. All the things I owned were not contributing to a better life. Even worse, they were keeping me from it. My wife and I, along with our two young kids, embarked on a journey to remove all the unnecessary possessions from our home and life. And with it,  came countless benefits. Real things like:  more money , more time,  more focus , and  less stress . One of the most surprising benefits I discovered along the way was the abil
Read more

EMBRACE EMPTY SPACES

Image
These past months, I have been busy packing to move to our new home. Since I cannot take a lot of stress, I decided to do my packing in stages.  Right at the beginning, about two months back when renovation work was underway, I went through all the stuff I had in my drawers, cupboards, etc that I didn't think I would need for the next two months. I call them my RARELY USED ITEMS.  I was able to purge quite a lot of stuff from this category very easily as I wasn't in love with them, didn't really see much use for them and knew that I wouldn't miss them. I had to find new homes for some of them too. So it was good that I started early.  There were quite a number of things, however, that I didn't use but had sentimental attachment to. I put these in a separate box to decide later about.  In one box, I put all my replacement items - duplicate things that I might need if what I used presently broke.  And so I managed to par down my possessions quite a bit. I felt relief,
Read more