I have a terrible mindset when it comes to money, I always think there’s more to be made.

I’m not wrong. But applying that attitude if you’re financially over-extended is only feeding the financial vacuum of your lifestyle even more into the abyss, and that really sucks. If you’re reading this right now, you’ve either been there are you are there. If that’s the case, you also know what being in debt can do to your stress level.

You need to fix it.

Your health is far more important than money. A bold statement, but a true one. Keep overspending, playing catch up, and living paycheck to paycheck and the health risks creep up silently. Money won’t be your only problem. Or rather, lack of enough of it.

Sure, when money’s tight you need to find another income stream or, gulp, ask for a raise. There’s a faster way to initially balance out your influx with your outflow. I’m going to share it with you at the end of this.

You might not like it, though.

It’s nothing new

Whoever raised you may have told you somewhere along the line to live within your means. I know that I’d heard it a few times in a variety of ways. I was told to take ten percent of everything that I earned and forget it was there.

It seemed simple enough. Ten percent didn’t seem like a big deal. Plus, that left plenty to live off of. Piece of cake.

Well, it seemed like a piece of cake, until I learned that I liked cake, lots of cake.

It wasn’t long before I’d spend my allotted ninety percent net earnings before my next paycheck showed up and start to eye my bucket ‘o savings. It was that other amount that was staring me in the face every time I logged into my bank account.

There it was- checking account on the first line, savings account on the second. They were dangerously tied together and it wasn’t long before I started shaving a little off to help feed my excessive sweet tooth. Clearly, that’s a metaphor for crap that I didn’t need, but I bought it anyway.

Over time, I started making the local convenience store part of my morning routine. Soon after, it became part of my lunch routine and spiraled into my evening routine. Coffee, other drinks, and snacks quickly came to twenty to thirty dollars a day.

Ouch.

It doesn’t take a CPA to be able to add that up in your head.

But why stop there? Take out or even sit-in restaurant meals a few nights a week, an in-app purchase on my phone, the all-too-easy amazon prime single-click to order…guilty, guilty, guilty.

On top of that, there were things that I bought that I never needed in the first place which were now taking up valuable space in my space.

The quick fix is not the fix

I like having stuff. I liked not worrying about spending excessively. In order to keep at it, I needed more money, so I just made more.

I grabbed a second full-time job and did some stuff on the side. Money in, money out. The more I made, the more I spent.

It was exhausting.

The hard truth

It’s not that I had to work all the time. I’m pretty efficient. I figured out the ratio of having a job to actually having to do something for said job years ago. What ate away at me, was that I had to be available all the time to my income streams. I was tethered every day.

I started to realize that the only way to not constantly be accountable to the hand that fed me, was to stop needing to eat so much.

That was it.

I needed to stop spending money on useless shit.

Once the realization was made I started slowing the cash-sucking snowball that I’d created. Whatever I saw that I could do without was like a little ray of sunshine at the end of the hole in my wallet.

I give you…the answer

It’s not perfect, but you need to start somewhere. The below suggestions are the low-lying fruit of your dying tree. Harvest away and continue pruning until you flip your bad financial decisions around.

A tough pill to swallow? Probably. Worth the medicine? Absolutely.

1) Make a better deal

As far as your cell phone plan goes, yes, there’s a better deal out there. You probably don’t need or use everything that’s currently included in what you’re paying for. Check into that.

For that matter, call whoever provides services to you and ask if they have a better deal to offer you. Be diligent, stand your ground, and if you have to, mention the junk mail offer that you received from their competition. Some won’t budge, others will.

A single phone call can save serious cash.

2) No more one-click ordering

Throw your stuff into your shopping cart and don’t checkout.

It’s funny how if you wait a day or two you realize that you don’t actually need something that previously caught your eye.

3) Cut it

Getting rid of cable and cord-cutting is a great idea, as long as you don’t fall prey to every streaming service out there and end up paying even more than you were for your nightly binge-watching sessions.

Spend a few minutes and do the math. Keep in mind that most of your favorite network TV shows are available the next day on a streaming platform.

4) Grocery shop online

I hate going to the grocery store. It’s just not fun for me.

Whether you feel the same way or not, order online. You see exactly what the final price is, you show up and they bring your goods to your vehicle. For budgeting reasons, this will save you so much money you’ll kick yourself for not doing it sooner.

While you’re browsing through the online food aisles, plan the week. Toss in things to cover you for breakfast and lunch. Put a little thought into dinner ideas. With a little perseverance, you’ll be having too much fun whipping up your own tasty creations to miss going out to eat all the time.

Maybe you’ll even start inviting friends and family over to show off your culinary skills.

5) Mug ‘o joe

Get a cool travel coffee mug and make your coffee at home.

Don’t know how? The basic method is one tablespoon of ground coffee per cup of water in your coffeemaker.

6) Pay your bills just before the due dates

If you’re the type to pay all of your bills on the first of each month, stop that. Whoever you owe doesn’t care when you pay them as long as you pay on time.

You’ll miraculously see what the rest of the world knows as cash flow. It becomes addictive. You’ll see that you always have some money in your checking account, you’ll like it, and you’ll flip back to that ten percent saving teen you always knew that you could be.

7) Sell shit

Yeah, I went there. People buy everything.

I’ve seen social media posts for porch pickup items that someone was asking two dollars for. If there’s something that you haven’t used in months, clean it up, take a few good pics, and post it online. Once you start clearing out your clutter, you might even realize that you can live comfortably in a smaller space.

8) Bonus tip

If your credit is still in decent standing and your car keeps breaking down, buy or lease a new one.

Seriously. The cost of a new vehicle is the monthly payment. The cost of a paid-off vehicle that keeps having issues is the bill to get it fixed and the inconvenience of being without it while you wait for it to get fixed. The loan or lease payment is probably much cheaper if you look at what you’re spending each year. Plus, warranty. Yay.

I could keep going. The point is, to figure out what you can do without. If you’re honest with yourself, you’ll find more freedom with having less than with having more.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not intended to be investment or financial advice. Seek a duly licensed professional for investment or financial advice.