Resourceful | Financial Challenge 2012

I’ve been doing much a lot of evaluation lately with myself and everything around me. I am responsible for whatever debt I’ve accumulated or brought upon myself. This includes my biggest debt, student loans. Although, I think it is good to invest in secondary education, the economy and government makes its so hard for us to get through without so much half-stepping. My goal for 2012 has been to get my financial situation is some serious order. Frivolous spending habits and living above our means is a sure fire way to keep us broke or in debt. So, I took it upon myself to do some research. Below is an article on how you can begin looking for ways to save and budget your life.

5 Unconventional Money-Saving Tips

For me, the hardest part about learning to save was changing my relationship with money. I understood intellectually that I needed to spend less than I earned, and I could see the debt accumulating as I spent, but money management isn’t just about knowing the math. It’s mostly about knowing yourself. It’s about building self-discipline, and about learning to see money in new ways.

While browsing at Passion Saving the other day, I discovered an article featuringten unconventional money-saving tips. Each of these offers a new way to see money. Here are author Rob Bennett’s ten tips along with my comments. (Note that I’ve re-ordered these from the original article.)

1. Pursue short-term saving goals. While saving for retirement may be the ultimate goal, it’s not always a motivational one. Break long-term goals into chunks. Find saving goals that can be completed in just a few years.
2. Don’t save in pursuit of vague and general goals — save in pursuit of a particular change to enhance your life. Make savings matter by setting money aside for lots of specific little things throughout the course of your lifetime. You’re not just saving to be able to do what you want at the end of your life, but to also to be able to do the things you wanttoday.
3. Pursue intensely personal goals. “The trick to becoming an effective saver is identifying [with something, a] saving goal that provides you with the motivation needed to get the job done, ” Bennett writes. “To save well, you need to direct your money management energies to the pursuit of a goal that hits your emotional hot buttons.””
4. Stop thinking of saving as something that only misers do well. “There’s nothing small or cheap or sick about effective saving, ” writes Bennett. “Not if you’re doing it right. Save for the right sorts of reasons — life-enhancing reasons — and you will no longer think of saving as miserly.”
5. Don’t pay yourself first. Instead, pay yourself last. This recommendation sets a sacred personal-finance mantra on its ear. Bennett says that thinking of savings as something that must be endured makes it seem like eating your least-favorite vegetable. “Pay yourself first ” might be a good way to start saving, but to really make it effective, you must learn to see saving as fun. You need to pay yourself last — and often. Reduce your spending so there’s as much as possible left to save.