Everyone has a story
Everyone has spending and saving story. What is your spending and saving story?
I don’t want anyone to feel discouraged that they can’t save or they feel that they are stuck because they don’t “save” enough.
I truly believe everyone has a story and if you want to change that story you can do it.
It takes some mindset changes. You must break old habits while creating new habits.
I love Spending and Saving
If we sat down and had a cup of coffee and talked about spending and saving I will admit that I don’t talk about saving all of the time.
That would be boring!
Seriously, who wants to hear about savings rates and savings goals. The point is to have enough saved up in the future so we can spend it.
Spending is enjoyable. I get it.
I love spending.
I love spending. My husband and I agree that we both enjoy spending money.
Really! We admit it.
We know it. We have a lot of stuff too.
We wish we were minimalists but we aren’t. A minimalist is someone who has very few items. I’m ok accepting that.
We have reduced a lot of things in our lives but we still have a lot of “things”.
We both have different hobbies and interests.
I love good food. For example: We love Sushi.
I enjoy sewing. I enjoy writing calligraphy. I also love creating crafts, knitting, learning about history, reading and so much more.
Yesterday I finished some handmade Christmas cards for our amazing teachers. My kids were so happy to hand them out! #christmas #christmascards #teachers #handmadechristmas #handmade #handmadegifts pic.twitter.com/0Tqitu7Ik6
— Holly Grosvenor (@MS_FinanceCoach) December 20, 2018
My husband likes to woodwork, work on cars and machine metal work to name a few hobbies. Between the two of us, we started our marriage with a lot of bins of things.
Plus, my children have them too. My kids love to draw, create new imaginary items, and play with lots of toys.
I think having a hobby is so good for the soul and brain.
It challenges us and we never are bored. I don’t think I have ever been bored in this house.
We also enjoy spending time with our family and friends plus making new ones. We love to entertain.
It’s a mindset and habit
We were taught young to save for things we want.
It became a habit.
We were very fortunate to have saved early. That doesn’t mean you can’t do the same or even start now.
The way we did it was simply paying ourselves first and as we adjusted our spending to the limited amount of money we had.
Not uncommon, we also had the habit of buying things we didn’t really need. Yes, we could have been extreme savers our younger years and saved 50% or more of our income but we didn’t. Yeah, maybe if we knew what we know now we would have saved a bit more but you know what I’m so glad we did what we did.
We found the right balance.
It all comes down to balance.
It all comes down to balance. Finding the right balance for you and your family.
You make a choice and that choice is yours.
There are some people that will say that you “shouldn’t” spend on that, or you “should” spend on this. The point you have to figure out is what is the right balance for you. Everyone has a spending story.
Living within your means is great and can be done while still enjoying good things in life.
Why I love saving!
The best part about saving is it gives you freedom! It is the freedom of choice for your future self. Paying yourself first is like giving money to your future self to spend. Looking in the future I can see my future self-enjoying that money.
Paying yourself first – is my favourite phrase and is all anyone needs to do to gain wealth and financial freedom.
In the financial independence community, it is stressed to save 50% or more of your income. I think it makes a lot of sense. For someone that hasn’t done any savings of any kind, I suggest starting at 10% or 20% savings goals in order to create a new habit and find the right balance. 50% or more would be a fantastic goal.
Just remember it is the journey, not the end. Life still needs to be enjoyed. Finding the right balance that fits your lifestyle is key.
Everyone has a Spending and Saving story. What is your spending and saving story? How do you change yours?
I really enjoyed your flexible tone in this piece and the advice to start small. I didn’t keep track of our savings rate in the past (and only recently started looking at it as a metric). I think at times we have saved 50% or more. Currently, we are saving 33%-40% depending on how things are arranged (like should my husband’s employer match count or not – things like that). I think it can really change for people over time and that is OK as long as good general habits are in place.
I really like your photos too by the way. Cute!
Thank you so much for stopping by and commenting. Congratulations on your savings rate whether it is 50%, 40% or 33%! That is a huge achievement. I think you should include your husband’s employer match just make sure you include that in the denominator as income as well since it is more income. 🙂