Thursday, November 10, 2016

Review Writing Exercise: Mr. Money Mustache by Paige Riebel

Get Rich With: Your Own Urban Tribe


This article explains what exactly Mr. Money Mustache means when he refers to "your own urban tribe." His definition of this term is explained as simply establishing your own group of people dedicated to saving and living extravagant frugality like yourself. Through your tribe, you can seek encouragement and support as you live life as the "odd-ball" of society. your tribe becomes your heart family. You work hard with your tribe, have cookouts with your tribe, make music and play games with your tribe, but most of all, your tribe always has your back. Your tribe is your community and Mr. Money Mustache states that through your tribe community you begin to see that  "leisure and work tend to blur together." 

I think this article does a really good job at relating to the emotion aspects of having a tribe. The author ties in many personal stories of his experiences with his close-knit tribe. The author also does a fine job of encouraging the reader to establish a tribe in unexpected places. The fifth section of this article is titled, Great Friends are Hiding Among Your Neighbors. I think this is one of the sections where the article was most strong. The author makes an excellent and rational point of writing, "Why focus your energy on traveling to meet friends who live several cities away, while ignoring those right next door who you haven’t even met yet?" He explains that, yea, your tribe can be made up of people from different cities and states, but their very nature of a tribal community is locality, so by finding a tribe in your area, the community aspect will be stronger.

I think the weakest section of this article is the third section named Lessons in Tribalism from my Summer Vacation. I think this section made the article have a nice personal feel to it, but it was more of just a story-telling section and not so much an applicable advice/ interaction section - like the rest of the article was posed to be. The purpose of Mr. Money Mustache and his blog is to educate and convince others to follow his living of purpose driven frugality and I did not feel like this section was very effective in relating this to his readers. I am not saying that personal experiences and stories should not be involved in convincing someone to turn their ways, but I am saying that I think an overwhelming emphasis of personal story-telling can seem feeble when used in the way Mr. Money Mustache has used it in this section. I also feel as though the specific stories he shared, were not very relevant or compelling compared to the rest of the information he shared in this article. 

Having grown up in a big family that practices frugality and simple, holistic living, I personally do find the emphasis on a tribe to be very crucial. Over the years, my family has developed a strong community of those who have the same values and mindsets as we do. I find this community to be just as Mr. Money Mustache has explained it to be - encouraging and reassuring. I feel like as a society everyone just does what everyone else is doing and I before my like-minded community or "tribe", it was hard to stick with my different approach to living. So, in conclusion, I do strongly agree with this article and all it has presented. I believe everyone should find their tribe. I believe everyone should surround themselves with people who are going to continue lighting their passions, boosting their positivity, and igniting their dreams and aspirations! 

3 comments:

  1. I agree that it is extremely hard to stick to a different approach of living without having a community that is living the same way. And I love your final sentence, very true and I aspire to do so. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Having a group of people to join you in saving money, would help so much more into sticking with your plan.

    ReplyDelete
  3. This seems like a great article for many people, as it encourages them to become friends with people who lead them to save money, rather than spend money to compete with each other for who has the nicest things.

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.