The Frugal Mindset
One thing that is becoming very hot in my mini-zeitgeist aka seems to be more common and talked about in my circle of friends is this idea of frugality and early retirment. In essence it means living under your means and saving and investing so you can quit your job as early as possible and enjoy live.
Of course, this comes with 10-15 years of various sacrifices. Some are easy to make, some are harder but in the end, those years are still part of your life.
Take coffee. In a frugal lifestyle, spending 100$ per month per coffee ( that's specialty coffee daily ) is seen as idiotic. For me though, is the best part of my day! I don't have that many social interactions in the daily basis and going out and enjoying a good coffee, smelling the air, saying hi to random people is part of what makes life worth living...but many frugalist would say that's not true or that you can bring a cup from home and enjoy ti on the bench. TRUE! but...again, this is specialty coffee not something you can do at home easily.
Another big spending-cut for people following the frugal lifestyle are clothes. There are guys talking about never buying a new shirt cause they get some free at various conferences. Or never buying new shoes as NIKE has an exchange program for some of their shoes ( aka when they break after years and years of wear, they give you a new pair for free ). Now all this is cool but also so sad. Clothes to me are important. While I am mindful of the environmental cost of clothes and I try to buy less ( actually I am doing pretty well here! ) the idea of wearing the same thing daily, no matter the context is dire. Clothes are self-expression and say something about me in this world. It's also a signal for other people to understand who I am in the social structure of our society. It's important.
Of course, there are tons of these little things and some are really doable and useful. For me, is more about spending less on actual crap. The impulse buy of a crockpot I never use, the XL sushi plate cause 20 rolls just won't do!! The gym membership. Little things that add up and could make a nice difference in the long run.
How about you? What can't you live without but would save you some good money in the long run?
I think food is something that I spend way too much on lately to be honest :)
what? you? no way man, you're like 100% the most frugal steemian around
That's kind of bad for other steemians :P
Nike has an exchange program? I used to wear nikes but I got tired of spending $100 for a new pair when they wore out. Now I just buy everything I can at Walmart. I like buying all my clothes at Walmart because not only does it save a fortune on clothes it saves a fortune in time. I could probably live without two BMWs but I probably wouldn't want to.
haha. so wait, you have 2 BMWs and buy clothes at Walmart? That's pretty cool and unexpected. But why two?! One should be more than enough :D
I had one and then last summer a rock went in my engine and trashed it and I thought it was totaled so I searched 3 states for another one, after I bought it it turned out I was able to rebuild the first car so I did that. The problem is the new car I bought was not a sport package and I was mislead into thinking it was and when I realized it was not shortly after buying it I was really upset. I tried to sell it because I hated it so but since then it has grown on me. I drive it on Sundays now. I was out on Sunday night, actually coming home from Walmart, when a fellow tried to race me at a stop light. Mind you this is a 15 year old base touring model, so I stomped on it. I stayed right next to him for quite a while and then the road went to one lane so I let him win, then a state trooper popped up and went right by me to pull him over. He had a tuned S2000 with a sticker that said "the lowered life" on it.
Walmart has the best clothes, consider how much they pay their buyers to know what the fashions are and to stock their stores accordingly.
cool story! :)) vengeance in the end!
It was like Back to the Future III.
that's like exactly the image I had in my head!!
I've tried to stop buying so much coffee when I'm out - I take a bamboo cup with coffee in from home or my thermos flask when I go to the park. Yes it saves money, but it also saves on buying coffee in disposable cups. I'm making an effort to do this with cold drinks too - I carry a reusable bottle full of water with me rather than buying water in plastic bottles when I'm out.
In the house I'm looking at our plastic consumption and I'm thinking I'm going to move over to making soaps - hair soaps, body soaps, laundry soaps - I already use french olive oil soap for cleaning and laundry stains and it is very cost effective. I just look at the amount of plastic bottles in my bathroom and kitchen and I think could this be replaced with a few bars of soap?
I know your post is about being more frugal, but from approaching things from the angle of reducing waste I seem to be saving money too!
That is a good argument for writing a spending plan and sticking to it. If your plan includes a daily cappuccino and also meets the savings goals that let you retire early, then you can sip coffee in the park with a guilt free heart.
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Hello @razvanelulmarin, thank you for sharing this creative work! We just stopped by to say that you've been upvoted by the @creativecrypto magazine. The Creative Crypto is all about art on the blockchain and learning from creatives like you. Looking forward to crossing paths again soon. Steem on!
thanks :D