Living beneath your means is the trick. For most people, this is a major struggle. Maybe they have a case of Stuffitis, or maybe they’ve embraced the idea that they’ll never have anything. Without any effort whatsoever, this is the common equation: income increases = bills increase. So in order to live beneath your means, you have to crack this code, and beat the system. Whether you make $1000/month or $50,000/month, you’ll never have any money until you learn keep some of it.

So one way to save money, is to follow this guide. Make a game out of this. Set an amount of money to have left over at the end of the month. If you don’t make much and are struggling, make it a small amount at first……maybe $50. This is $50 that you WILL NOT spend no matter what. You can plan to save it at once, or you can put back $12.50 per week or however you want to do it. Now your objective is to find whatever short-cuts you can for the whole month. Look for the cheapest way you can find to do everything. This is a great exercise to live beneath your means. More than likely, you’ll have more than $50 at the end of the month.

I know this sounds simplistic, but I assure you it will work. The neat thing is, if you save $50 the first month, and try again the next month, you can probably find new ways to cut a few more corners, and save even more. This will be extremely hard, maybe impossible if you have Stuffitis. If you constantly keep your eye on stuff, and you have a mental list of what your gonna get next time you have a little money, you’ll never save one cent. So make up your mind to be content with what you have, and make this work.

I know this has been a fairly short post, that got right to the point, but it’s no less important. The only way to live beneath your means, save money, and avoid stuffitis, is to make up your mind. Get ticked off, bite your bottom lip, and get after it!

Filed under: Budgeting, Stuffitis