What Kind of Life Do You Want to Live?

A lot of successful people have taken poverty as a challenge which brought them to where they are at present.  But many have also fallen victims of poverty that they have become rascals and notorious criminals for money’s sake. 

I could vividly remember my first ever tour in one of the prominent states in America- Hawaii during the peak of recession.  That time, in some states of the US, many were laid off from their jobs because a lot of companies were at the verge of bankruptcy. However when I came to Hawaii in December 2008, my fellow Filipinos said that Hawaii was spared from recession since only few were laid off and business was still the same as usual.  Yet, this claim seemingly contradicted what had happened one night in one of the Catholic churches there.  It was Sunday when my host family and I went to hear Mass.  I was very surprised after the mass when I heard an Asian priest say that a burglar broke into the Church, stealing all the offerings the previous Sunday.   The priest further said that it was the first time that such abominable act happened in the history of Hawaii.   What could have driven a person to do such a crime?  I could only think of one- poverty.  May be that person was forced to do it out of necessity to provide his family food on the table.  When a person is hungry and his family too, even wrong deed for him becomes right. 

In the Philippines, on the other hand, crimes like theft, hold upping, and snatching frequently happen during Christmas season in Metro Manila. The reason is that family men and women as well as street children, who commit crimes, want to provide their family gifts and food for Christmas.   What ironical, isn’t it?  Out of love for family, people are forced to do crimes.  But don’t they know that their would-be victims also wish to provide for their families?  And if they happen to snatch someone’s wallet, for instance, that person may need that money to buy food for Noche Buena and gifts too for his/her family. 

In these scenarios I presented, the bottom line is poverty leads a person to engage in illegal acts just so that he or she could address his/her family’s needs because he/she was left with no more option. Indisputably, poverty has been a culprit for all crimes. Show me a very poor country, for sure, crime rates are on the rise there.   That explains too why there are still crimes in my native land.  How then can we address poverty to eliminate its worse consequences?

Obama, in his book, The Audacity of Hope, says that the only solution to end the vicious cycle of poverty is education.  This premise was based on his visit to a poor African American community in the US.  There, he saw for himself how people have been experiencing poverty simply because most of them are not educated.

Obama is right in his belief that people are poor because of their lack of education.  What companies will then  provide the uneducated employment if they are not intellectually capable nor technically skilled to match the qualifications needed in vacant posts?

Hence, education is indeed significant to be able to liberate oneself from poverty.  What kind of life then do you wish to live – a life of financial success or a life of poverty?  The choice is yours to make.