If you're leaving home for the first time, just striking out on your own, there are a few things you need to know to be successful. You must have a basic understanding of how to maneuver in today's complex social and economic society, and that isn't something you can pick up in the traditional education system. Instead of learning the hard way, place yourself on the pathway to success with a guidebook that outlines basic life skills in fifteen short and simple chapters. You will find meaningful information that will help you remain independent, including how to make the right decisions, write a resume that will get you a professional job, buy a vehicle at a reasonable price, get your own place, and live on a budget. Don't just rely on what you were taught in high school as you begin a journey that's completely your own. Take a practical approach to life's greatest obstacles to ensure you live the life you want as soon as possible. Get the guidance you need as you move from Dependence to Independence.

DEPENDENCE to INDEPENDENCE

I Think I Can ... I Know I CanBy André J. Olivan Sr.

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 André J. Olivan Sr.
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4620-5501-2

Contents

Introduction...............................................v1. Things to Consider......................................12. Employment..............................................133. Transportation..........................................254. Getting Your Own Place..................................435. Budget..................................................656. Banking.................................................757. Establishing Credit.....................................878. Managing Your Medical Information.......................1079. Duties To Society.......................................11910. Balancing Responsibilities.............................12911. Real Estate - Owning Your Own Home.....................13912. Serving Your Country...................................15513. Understanding Taxation.................................16314. Recordkeeping..........................................18115. Conclusion.............................................187

Chapter One

Things To Consider

* * *

Your Quality of Life Depends 0n Your Choices

Evaluate Your Motive Behind Your Decision

Identify The Steps In Making A Good Decision

Identify The Difference Between Rationalization And Justification

Apply The Ben Franklin Technique

Confidence In Making A Good Decision

How to Make the Right Decision

Life is full of choices. There are always consequences resulting from the decisions you make. You are accountable for your own actions. It is therefore imperative that you try to make good choices and appropriate decisions. You have to establish a method or process to evaluate choices that have a direct affect on your future. In order to make a good and intelligent decision you must be honest with yourself. We want to help you keep the process simple.

There are many factors which go into how you make decisions. You are often influenced by emotions when making an important decision. This can be a disadvantage. You often make impulsive choices rather than being thoughtful in your decision making process. There are times when an immediate decision is completely appropriate. However most of the time it is in your best interest not to be too hasty when making the decision.

Impulse causes you to want something right now. Impulse is defined as "a sudden, unreasoned inclination to action". Rationalization can be thought of as talking yourself into something you want. It is convincing 'yourself' of something. It is best to avoid rationalizing your way into a decision. Needing is defined as "having an urgent or essential use for something lacking."

The first step in making a good decision is defining the difference between wants and needs. You will need to ask yourself questions to help you through the process of differentiating whether this is a want or a need decision. Ask yourself questions that will justify what you are trying to accomplish. Justifying is defined as, "searching for a reason, fact, circumstance, or explanation that will guide you to a solid and sound decision" for example, what is in your best interest over the long term.

To summarize, you should always be able to justify rather than rationalize your decisions.

Ben Franklin's Decision Making Process

Ben Franklin is one of the finest role models in our Country's history. He exemplified intelligence, integrity, confidence, and steadfast values. In his lifetime, he faced many personal obstacles and made both personal decisions as well as decisions on behalf of his country.

It has been said that Ben Franklin had one of the best and easiest ways of processing a decision. He simply took out a sheet of plain paper and drew a large T on it. On one side, he wrote the word pros and on one side the word cons. In his evaluation, he listed all the positive effects of the decision he was pondering under the pros side of the T. Under the cons side of the T, he listed all the negative effects of the proposed decision. Once he had listed all of his thoughts as either pros or cons, he simply chose the side with more items listed under it and made his decision accordingly.

To take this a step further, once you have completed the basic method used by Ben Franklin, you should go back and identify by order of importance each of the items listed in both pros and cons. One way to do this would be to identify each of the items listed in your pros and cons columns as either a Want; an Impulse; a Rationalization; a Need; or a Justification. By doing so, you can then weight the importance of each item and rather than simply making your decision based on the number of items in each category, you are now making your decision based on the importance or validity of each item in each category. Remember, it is very important that you be completely honest with yourself at this point.

Here are the steps -

1. List the advantages and disadvantages to the decision as outlined on the previous page

2. Grade each of the advantages and disadvantages using the following key.

3. Now, be honest with yourself and determine what is in your best interest when making a decision.

Once you have truthfully identified and graded each item by its importance or validity, the answer should then be very clear to you. The Needs and Justification items should have a greater weight on your decision than the Wants, Impulse, and Rationalization items. Instead of making an emotional decision, you have now made an appropriate and solid decision.

Occasionally, you will ponder an issue and still not be sure what the right decision should be. In a case such as this, go with your heart instinct. It is better to make some decision than to make no decision at all and get into the bad habit of procrastinating. Procrastination is putting things off. This causes undue stress and causes you not to be productive in your life.

To conclude, even a good decision can turn out to be a mistake. If you go through the process of being truthful in evaluating the best decision and it turns out to be a mistake, remember that the best learning curve often results from mistakes. More than likely, you won't repeat the mistake. None of us are perfect. Just try to consciously make good decisions. The rest will come with experience.

In this example, the disadvantages outweigh the advances 9 to 8 and therefore, the decision should be made NOT to purchase the car.

Think carefully about the advantages and disadvantages of the decision. Be honest with yourself. Ask others for their input and advice and consider it objectively.

Chapter I Summary

1. Your quality of life depends on your choices:

? It's important for you to make good decisions

? Choices and decisions drive your actions

? You are accountable for your own actions

2. Motives that influence your decisions are:

? Wants

? Impulse

? Rationalization

? Needs

? Justification

3. You should identify your steps for making a good decision:

? Defining the difference between Wants and Needs

? Understanding and knowing the difference between -...