When do I follow a budgeting process?
Follow a budgeting process as early as possible in your life. Getting accustomed to this lifestyle becomes more difficult later in your years.
What you are doing here is not just a change of lifestyle but also a change in your mindset. The later you attempt to adjust to this lifestyle and mindset, the more difficult you will find it. It is human nature to resist change.
We find every excuse NOT to change.
I’m not saying it can’t be done…. It CAN be done….. All I’m saying is that adjusting your lifestyle to follow a budgeting process is far easier when you are younger then when you are older BUT starting later is not a train smash either.
Better late than never!
What you are doing here is not just a change of lifestyle but also a change in your mindset. The later you attempt to adjust to this lifestyle and mindset, the more difficult you will find it. It is human nature to resist change.
We find every excuse NOT to change.
I’m not saying it can’t be done…. It CAN be done….. All I’m saying is that adjusting your lifestyle to follow a budgeting process is far easier when you are younger then when you are older BUT starting later is not a train smash either.
Better late than never!
Why should I follow a budgeting process?
You already know the answer to this. We are all in fear of financial ruin. Not following and sticking to a budgeting process will:
Sorry for painting such a doom and gloom scenario but it is what it is. Prevent yourself from becoming another statistic and help yourself by purchasing my eBook Budgeting Made Easy for just $5.00 and save yourself by using the approach we cover.
- Create a false sense of security
- Forces you to live paycheck-to-paycheck
- You remain undisciplined with the way you spend your hard earned money
- And eventually, you realize that you are living to pay your bills
Sorry for painting such a doom and gloom scenario but it is what it is. Prevent yourself from becoming another statistic and help yourself by purchasing my eBook Budgeting Made Easy for just $5.00 and save yourself by using the approach we cover.
This eBook will show you:
- how to quickly create and use a budgeting process?
- how to try and reduce debt in most of the biggest expenses we face?
- how to save money at specific key moments in your life?
How do I follow a budgeting process and stick with it?
Understand that the problem starts with YOU and ends with YOU. Your mind is your own worst enemy. We live in a world filled with instant gratification and we got used to this way of living.
Following a budgeting process not only requires an adjustment to the way you handle your money but also means you are going against the grain from the way MOST people handle their money.
If that is not hard enough, you now have to find a way to keep doing this not just year on year but every month, every week, every day, every hour and every minute. Sounds like a bit of an exaggeration but not really. Why?
Imagine you sitting at home, browsing the net on your favorite online shopping website, you stumble across an item you always wanted or see an item you never knew about and now that you have seen it, you want it more than ever. You check the price tag, it’s a little pricey. You don’t have the cash but you have access to loans to cover the cost. You start thinking you can pay the money back quickly. You talk yourself in to believing that you can afford the purchase. All thoughts of saving and been responsible begins to take a back seat.
In that minute, you make the impulsive decision to make the purchase.
You feel excited, content and a deep feeling of satisfaction. You wait for the delivery of your purchase. When you receive the item, you use it regularly for a while. As time goes by, you use the item less frequently or eventually, it becomes another piece of furniture and the feelings of joy it created when you first purchased the item disappears over time and you are now looking for the next item that creates these feelings again.
To follow a budgeting process and to stick with it, you need to do the following:
Consider the feelings of instant gratification of purchasing something and now compare that emotion to the weight lifted of your shoulders when you eventually eliminate a debt which felt like a lifelong prison sentence. Which emotion is far more satisfying?
Following a budgeting process not only requires an adjustment to the way you handle your money but also means you are going against the grain from the way MOST people handle their money.
If that is not hard enough, you now have to find a way to keep doing this not just year on year but every month, every week, every day, every hour and every minute. Sounds like a bit of an exaggeration but not really. Why?
Imagine you sitting at home, browsing the net on your favorite online shopping website, you stumble across an item you always wanted or see an item you never knew about and now that you have seen it, you want it more than ever. You check the price tag, it’s a little pricey. You don’t have the cash but you have access to loans to cover the cost. You start thinking you can pay the money back quickly. You talk yourself in to believing that you can afford the purchase. All thoughts of saving and been responsible begins to take a back seat.
In that minute, you make the impulsive decision to make the purchase.
You feel excited, content and a deep feeling of satisfaction. You wait for the delivery of your purchase. When you receive the item, you use it regularly for a while. As time goes by, you use the item less frequently or eventually, it becomes another piece of furniture and the feelings of joy it created when you first purchased the item disappears over time and you are now looking for the next item that creates these feelings again.
To follow a budgeting process and to stick with it, you need to do the following:
- Stop justifying the purchase of items that provide instant gratification.
- Stop fooling yourself that there is more time to save in the future.
- Before making a purchase, remind yourself what sort of mess your finances are (but don’t be obsessive about it) and what sort of problems you will solve by following a budgeting process.
- Stop saying: “I want to enjoy my youth”, followed by making a bad financial decision.
- Stop trying to keep up with the Joneses.
- Understand that if you are taking away money that was meant to go towards your savings, or buying an item that you wanted on credit, then you are spending money that you don’t have.
- If you contemplating buying an item on credit, consider on one side, the duration of paying back the money as well as the total amount of money you are losing to that item compared to the feelings of short lived gratification that comes with the purchase. Now ask yourself, is it worth it?
Consider the feelings of instant gratification of purchasing something and now compare that emotion to the weight lifted of your shoulders when you eventually eliminate a debt which felt like a lifelong prison sentence. Which emotion is far more satisfying?
How does marketing and advertising play a role in you NOT accomplishing your financial goals?
Understand that there is a direct relationship between instant gratification and long term debt. We live in a world that is consumed with getting more money. People want to save or earn more money, the tax man wants to generate more money for the country, governments want to make more money to attract more foreign investments and businesses want to increase their profit margins. In a world so obsessed with taking what we can, what are you to do?
Well, you have no control over the tax man or governments so you need to strive towards complete control over your own emotions. If you do that, you will have one advantage over businesses. Let me explain further….
The main weapon that businesses have over us is their ability to entice us. They entice us using advertising and marketing strategies. By pulling on your emotions, you fall victim and begin justifying certain expenditures (their marketing strategies might even help with providing you with the excuses you were looking for).
DON’T FALL VICTIM TO MARKETING AND ADVERTISING TECHNIQUES!!!
Every time you dig into your money saved, you push your financial goals a little further away from your reach. Let’s explain it this way, you are giving away your money or should I say DONATING your hard earned money to businesses that are already multi-million dollar enterprises. Why make them rich, make yourself rich. Stay true to your efforts, stay determined by ignore marketing and advertising techniques and keep saving towards your financial goals.
Sacrificing now will mean that when you achieve your goals, you can afford to splurge later without feeling any remorse and no self-inflicting guilt trip. Easier said than done, I know, I fall victim as well. Changing your way of thinking and adopting this new mindset is initially difficult but when you do this, you will see for yourself (over a period of time) that it is worth the effort. Once you achieve this moment of (what I like to call) “financial enlightenment” than you will find it easier to adopt this way of life.
Well, you have no control over the tax man or governments so you need to strive towards complete control over your own emotions. If you do that, you will have one advantage over businesses. Let me explain further….
The main weapon that businesses have over us is their ability to entice us. They entice us using advertising and marketing strategies. By pulling on your emotions, you fall victim and begin justifying certain expenditures (their marketing strategies might even help with providing you with the excuses you were looking for).
DON’T FALL VICTIM TO MARKETING AND ADVERTISING TECHNIQUES!!!
Every time you dig into your money saved, you push your financial goals a little further away from your reach. Let’s explain it this way, you are giving away your money or should I say DONATING your hard earned money to businesses that are already multi-million dollar enterprises. Why make them rich, make yourself rich. Stay true to your efforts, stay determined by ignore marketing and advertising techniques and keep saving towards your financial goals.
Sacrificing now will mean that when you achieve your goals, you can afford to splurge later without feeling any remorse and no self-inflicting guilt trip. Easier said than done, I know, I fall victim as well. Changing your way of thinking and adopting this new mindset is initially difficult but when you do this, you will see for yourself (over a period of time) that it is worth the effort. Once you achieve this moment of (what I like to call) “financial enlightenment” than you will find it easier to adopt this way of life.
