The you're worth it argument....

A lot of buying is hopeful buying, that if I get X, Y or Z that I'll be a better person. Usually, X, Y and Z all take a certain amount of practice, boredom and frustration to be any good at. This usually happens at the beginning of the year when you make new years resolutions (note I have never made resolutions at Chinese New Year, nor ever heard the suggestion, something to wonder why --- later!) It's usually, let me get a new bike, or a treadmill or a guitar, or something else. And as you start shopping, you start convincing yourself that if I just get a nice one, I'll be more eager to do it. It'll sound better, I'll have more fun. Whatever, but in the end, 99 out of a hundred times, X, Y or Z will sit unused.

In truth, you're probably worth it, but you might not be doing what's best for you. I'm always amazed by the people who walk into an apartment and see a guitar laying around, even an old crappy hand me down, start tuning and make it sing. A person who loves music will play on a bad guitar as much as a great guitar, someone who hopes or dreams of making music may treat a nice guitar as like a gift certificate making it mandatory that they play since they invested so much, but it turns out that just like so many gift certificates, they go unused. The guitar does not get better unless i practice, i do not become fitter unless I ride the bike. It's hard when we play games with others, it's often worse when we play games on ourselves.

So how do we not give up before we start. Beg, borrow or be humble. Craigslist and the classifieds have the remnants of so many abandoned good intentions. If you buy frugal and it works out, you're farther along than you started since you discovered something you really love. If it's another dead end, you're out less money and can use the money you didn't spend to find your real passion. Things on the low end get sold cheap, you can't get much cheaper so you usually come out about even. Think about used cars, if it works it never drops below a certain price.

If you buy used, you're compacting, and most of all you're really finding out about that most elusive thing. yourself.