For one reason or another today I saw this quick video that talked about what you must do in life to save money. While watching it there were the usual points such as tracking your budget and finding discounts. However, the list just kept going on to the point where it felt like if the question was how do you walk you are then bombarded by all these instructions on how first you need to wear socks, shoes, calculate the gravity and wind turbulence, etc.

To be fair, maybe they were trying to aim more for a “Ways to save money” approach. I then started to read some articles on the same topic and sure enough it seemed to follow the same theme. I was thinking too, is one of the reasons that we over complicate it so much is because the simple answer sounds too simple? For example, I would think the the biggest answer on how to save money is to simply not spend it. I’m sure that answer would usually generate a “but” response.

I still think the most important thing about saving money is your mindset first and foremost. For example, I’m pretty sure people would say things like “You have to spend money, otherwise you can’t eat.” Like in that case though, you could still say the main way to save money is to find ways to not spend it. Example, find a way to say grow your own food. The key point out of that is so that you develop the mentality that you are essentially spending money for the convenience in having someone else do it for you as opposed to it being something you have no choice over.

Another more straight forward tip that a lot of people use which makes perfect sense is that if you want to save money then stop buying stuff that you don’t really need. Similar in that case, is the concept of simply not spending too simple to accept? That would make more sense to me if you are truly in a position of wanting to save money. For example, instead of only trying to find ways to reduce the cost of that $200 pair of sunglasses that you can’t really afford maybe it’s wiser to not buy it all. It all starts with how you perceive money I think. If you can’t get past the notion of saying there is no way you can do anything with no money then that is a good first step to work on.

So I was reading a story today that there was recently this celebrity breakup where the couple had been married for only about two months and they already filed for divorce. What stuck out to me was how their wedding was apparently over sixteen million dollars and to have the relationship end so fast it probably makes you think about it. But in general things like weddings are usually what people justify in spending a lot on even if they can’t afford all the glamor as it is a once in a lifetime event.

I usually hear reasons such as you only live once anyways and what if you all of a sudden disappear tomorrow as all your saved money will go to waste. I usually find reasons like that a little too lopsided as in contrast it would be like me saying what if you live to be 120 years old and for that one day you splurged it will result in you working the rest of your remaining years to pay that off?

Maybe it’s just me, but I always think about the future and with the event in question what you really want in the end usually doesn’t cost that much. Afterwards when you are spending money to make the event better it is more to enhance it rather than it being the main highlight, so to speak. Example, in my mind there is a difference between buying some good quality wedding clothes to look your best that day versus buying say super expensive stuff that you can’t really afford where people focus more on that.

I was talking to a person who was fairly young and he actually ran his own business. He still lived with his family and all too. Since his business is doing very well and his living expenses aren’t massive he usually has an excess amount of money at the end of the week. Not surprisingly, at times it seems like he doesn’t know what to do with it and so it is either spent on things like dining out or even gambling.

What is funny I thought is that usually for like myself when it comes to spending money I would think “Is it worth it” or “How much return can I get” whereas it seemed like for him in many cases it is more like “If I don’t spend it here I would there anyways” and so he just ends up using his money. I suppose it’s hard to break a habit like that in his scenario as he has an excess amount of money coming in and there is no real need for him to change when you think about it.

I know one person who broke that habit by simply getting a hobby of all things. Strange huh? You would think that you would need to work hard to show them the importance of saving for the the future and all. But really, just doing something that occupied his time more for when it is not business time worked like a charm. No reason why this couldn’t work too for most other people if there are people you are struggling with to try to change their financial habits.

This was kind of silly I thought. I was reading about a person’s comment on similar traits that people have who are debt free. And one of the points the person said was that luck plays a factor. Basically, factors such as you never experiencing a major disaster or health crisis that causes financial burden or say you won the lottery.

In my opinion debt is something that is fully controllable as you get it for the most part as a result of your purchasing habits. It’s kind of scary that some people say it is luck base though as I would think that means the mentality is that if you are in debt it is always someone else’s fault and never yours. That would stop you from really taking control of your finances.

If anything is luck based I would say maybe to a certain extent the amount of money you make such as if you did win the lottery for example. But plain budgeting and not spending more than you make is something that just takes discipline and planning.

There was a store that was having a clearance sale and for many of the items they did indeed look a lot cheaper. However, when it came to other items the clearance prices looked similar to the regular prices in other places. That got me thinking if the intent was to hopefully snag a few regular sales for a large crowd that would simply fall for the clearance sale frenzy.

I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case too as it is a very common practice for many retailers to have say a few big items to make you go down to the store and many times people just want to walk out with something. I usually find this as a good way to discover tricks that companies would do too so I know whether or not I can semi blindly trust that when they have a sale of some sort that it truly is one.

While this is a little bit of a stretch, you’d be surprised at how many times you can see the actual cost of the items during clearance sales as many employees are careless where when they bring out a pallet of items there are still large packing slips that are visible in terms of how much the company purchased the items for.