@bnt on Money #2: Frugality Is Overrated

bnt (53)in #life • 7 years ago (edited)

Frugality

Hello there! This is my second ever post and I'm quite excited to share it with all of my fellow steemians. All feedback is welcome, appreciated and WILL be upvoted! I will talk about why I think frugality is very overrated in modern society and why it's on your best interest to forget about it.

Being frugal has somehow become very fashionable in the last few years. The great recession of 2008 and high level of unemployment have left more spending-conscious citizens as a residue. As with every trend, being frugal will eventually go out of vogue and a reduced number of people will engage in it. But even so, there's a reason why being frugal has been such a prevalent activity in the world.

Now, before I even begin talking about the kind of frugality that I have found out works best for me, I'd like to address the elephant in the room. Being frugal doesn't mean you have to be a cheapskate. Let me repeat that: being frugal does not mean you have to be a cheapskate. I'm talking about the nowadays glamourized coupon pigs, extreme cheapskates and similar creatures. There's a fine line between excess frugality and mental illness.

Let me be even more blasphemous with my next example: Black Friday. That's right. We all know the tales of people waiting in line and camping outside a store, waiting fucking days before the store begins its sale, and even trampling over other customers or even be killed! That's beyond ridiculous. Your life is worth a lot. It certainly is worth more than a TV set or iPad or any other deal that could even put you in harm's way.

Yes, I'm asking to please have a bias towards being frugal with your time. Time is the one resource you cannot manufacture more of, we all get the same amount of moments in a day and those cannot be actually increased, just used better. Time is scarce, money is plentiful. If you get a choice between being frugal with your time or your money, always pick time.

There's nary a need for you to waste your time waiting in a line with the goal of getting your hands onto the latest gadget from that fruity company or just to save $50 on a flat screen TV. Indeed, it's been said that if you waste time, time will promptly return the favor and you better believe that's true. So be conscious, strategic and purposeful with the way that you allocate your time. You will often find that the better you invest your time, the higher returns that you get.

When I say that your life is worth more than a deal I want to address not only the deranged maniac cheapskates that I mentioned in the previous paragraph, but also anybody who is willing to spend copious amounts of time in any line or drive too far outside their city just to save a dollar or two.

Don't get me wrong, I like a good bargain like anybody else. It's just that I find the gargantuan lines and excessive waiting times unnecessary and counter-productive. The internet has made all of these adventures largely unnecessary or even foolish to take on. And sometimes spending nothing will be your best available deal. If you want to indulge yourself, however, please go ahead. Just do it safely and from the comfort of your own home or mobile device whenever possible.

Now, with that rant out of the way, let's get on with the best ways to be frugal and the purpose behind being frugal in the first place.

First of all, I'm not going to tell you to ditch the treats that you've grown accustomed to. You like the daily trip to Starbucks or eat out now and again? By all means, please continue. First rule of smart frugality is to not cheap out on the things that don't merit it. In other words, spend when you want to spend where spending a little extra is necessary.

See, being excessively frugal to me means a lot of things, mostly negative things. First of all, that kind of extreme frugality signals a lack of confidence in your ability to generate significant wealth in the future. You're holding on to your present money so hard and at the expense of everything else just because you don't think you can come up with more money later on. That is the exact opposite of the attitude you should have. As one of my favorite wealth connoisseurs MJ DeMarco says, wealth is generated on offense, not defense.

Secondly, you can easily alienate other people with excess frugality. I'm not saying you should let other people's agendas stop you, I want you to not do that for your own sake. It's uncomfortable to see someone try to milk every last penny out of a company, most of all people yourself.

Another common misconception is that being frugal is the same as purposefully depraving yourself of something or some experience. That's not what good frugality is about. Good frugality is based around spending when you need to, negotiating when you want to and saving the rest.

By itself, frugality is pretty much pointless. Meaning that you shouldn't get caught on being frugal on absolutely everything, because it's at that point where frugality stops becoming the means and it becomes and end in on itself. That's not right. Yes, you should be a crafty consumer and a conscious spender, but don't make the act of frugality the end-all be-all of your wealth game, because that'll get you nowhere.

Instead, you should aim to do something with the extra money you get out of being frugal. Saving that extra money at the amount of every day will get you in the habit of saving your money habitually. Sure, the quantities are small, even negligible sometimes, but this exercise will get you in the right mindset.

Sometimes the best frugality move is to save money by not spending it. In fact, this sole strategy is underrated. Try and be careful to manage your resources adequately and you'll be ahead of the game rather quickly.