Power of compounding

no longer able to feed his family with the his meager income,
the poor poet decided to go to capital
he wrote a special poem
to recite in front of the king

the king impressed by the beauty of his poetry
granted him a wish

the poor poet said, "my generous lord, have a grain of Rice placed on the first square of a chess board, and with each subsequent square double the number of grains. what ever is on the 64th square I shall consider it as my reward."

confused king asked "that is what you want for as your reward?"

the poor poet said " yes, my lord."

the generous king ordered " so shall be"

a large chess board was placed on the floor of the royal palace.
the servants started placing the grains on each of the squares of chess board

1st square 1 grain
2nd 2 grains
3rd 4 grains
and so on,
by the time 32 square is filled, the number of grains grew to 4294967296
by 48th square, king had to empty his food warehouse.
by 56th square entire city's grains fell short of the humongous number
and by the time 64th square is reached, the king had no choice but to hand over his kingdom to the cleaver poor poet!!!

that's the power of compounding.
A little every month and it will grow in a huge amount over the years.