via: DumbLittleMan
Finance is a huge part of our lives yet it remains something that many people struggle with. Today, more than ever before, people are getting into financial difficulties and debt.
The recession has been going on for a few years now and people's houses are still being repossessed. People are still losing their jobs. Worst of all, they're losing their freedom and independence.
What's saddest about people getting into debt is the ties it causes. It you're in debt you're often forced to stay in a job or an area you don't like in order to repay the debt. There's an incredible freedom that comes from being free of debt. Only when you're debt free can you actually live the life you want and be the master of your own destiny.
So here are my tips on how you can avoid getting into debt, simplified and repackaged in a way that I hope makes you see the true value of living within your means.
Start making these life changes to stay out of debt and save money today. There's no time like the present. Like any addict you'll suffer a bit at first, but when you get used to spending less you'll be glad you did. Leave your credit cards at home and reassess how to cut down your spending and what you'll do when you've controlled your spending and earned your own freedom.
Living within your means brings happiness and freedom that expensive new gadgets don't. If you can't afford to buy the car or TV of your dreams then don't buy it. Get what you can pay for in cash now and be happy with it. If you really need to buy a car to get from A to B then buy one you can easily afford.
Don't be tricked into finance plans that offer "18 months interest free". If you can't afford to buy the item for cash now you may not be able to in 18 months either. If you buy something on those crazy "free credit" terms, you'll be paying over the odds for it and you won't be free anymore. You'll be tied down to making those repayments until they're paid off. Much better to save up, pay cash and live free.
Maybe you're worried about what people will think about your unfashionable car or clunky TV? Don't be. Anyone who judges you by that isn't worth worrying about anyway.
Little things like clothes, skincare, & toiletries add up. Just get what you need. I'm sure that many of us in developed countries have many more clothes than we can actually wear. That's why I've classified clothes as non-essentials here. How many pairs of jeans and t-shirts does one person actually need? I'd be prepared to bet that it's not as many as you've already got, especially if you're female. Sorry girls!
I've just spent a year without buying any new clothes, apart from some new sports socks when my old ones had gone to holes and a pair of shoes for a wedding. It wasn't as if I was going to be naked. I had more than enough clothes to see me through the year and I think I even managed to look quite nice most of the time too.
It was great not to bother going to shops and shopping centers and also good at the end of the year to evaluate what I actually needed clothes-wise and spend a few hours clothes shopping. If you can't cut down your clothes shopping to once a year try shopping for clothes only twice a year, maybe when the sales are on.
Or have a clothes and accessories swap party. Invite about 10 friends of varying sizes and tell them to bring the clothes and accessories they never wear. You'll be laughing over each others' disaster buys and amazed to see how good your unflattering trousers look on someone else. This is a cheap, fun night in and a great way to bond with friends.
When it comes to skincare and toiletries get cheaper brands. The pricier ones aren't worth it, you're just paying for the expensive advertising campaigns and the supermodels who promote them. Now why would you want to do that?
So you really need something?
Do you really need it? Really? Truly? It's amazing how many things I think I need and write on my list but never get round to buying because I don't go to the shops very often. If you go shopping every week, apart from to the grocery store or food market, then you're probably spending more than you need to just by being in the shopping mall. Avoid shopping malls like the plague, especially if you have kids with you.
But let's say you've convinced me there's something you really need, your bike's broken beyond repair and you really need a new one to get to work. Please, never buy anything, new or used, without taking the time to ask these two questions:
What's the best price you can do for me? Can you do a better deal for cash? You'll probably get one discount this way but you might even get two price cuts.
If you can wait until the annual sales, you might get a better deal. Or put a search on Ebay, go to garage sales and tell your friends and colleagues you're in the market for a new bike to see if anything comes up.
Sometimes renting can be cheaper than buying, especially if house prices aren't increasing. Don't be pressurized into buying a house or buying a more expensive house than you can easily afford the mortgage repayments on. You're not buying a better house, you're buying worry and financial pressure.
Forget silly food coupons, just make sure you bulk buy and buy the supermarkets own brands. With most items (basmati rice, virgin olive oil, canned tomatoes, pasta, etc.) some of the cheaper brands taste just as good as the more expensive brands to me. There are only a few things I'm fussy about - I have to have the more expensive brand of mayonnaise - but for most things you'll probably find the no name brands are just as good. Pick and choose your products carefully.
For example, go to the movies on cheap Tuesdays or wait for the DVD to come out to the $1 RedBox. Most things have promotions at certain times of the year or on certain days, you've just got to wait for them.
I love eating out. I don't do it as often as I'd like but it's a real treat for me to go to a cafe or restaurant and eat a meal someone else has cooked and will clear away for me too. I just don't get the idea of takeouts though. Most of them don't taste as good as the food you'd make at home and it's not that hard to wash up a chopping board and a couple of saucepans. Most healthy food is quick to make at home too (things like stir-fry and omelets) or can be prepared in bulk so you can freeze some to reheat on another day (curries and soups.)
I know often you may want to socialize without feeling you need to kill yourself with cooking and shopping. Try having a curry night and asking everyone to bring along one dish. Or just a potluck and see what happens. Or a fun sushi night where everyone knuckles down and learns how to make their own sushi.
What will you do when you're out of debt and in control of your finances? Keep your prize on the goal and you'll get there in the end.
 | Written on 2/20/2010 by Annabel Candy. Annabel writes Get In the Hot Spot, a blog to inspire and inform people on how to live their dream, no matter what they're dreaming of. |
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via: ZenHabits
Photo by The 10 cent designer
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. - Leonardo da Vinci
Post written by Leo Babauta. Follow me on Twitter.
The problem with many books and guides on simplifying your clutter, your work life, your desk, your life, is that they are usually too darn complicated.
We need a simple method of simplifying.
It’s been nearly a decade since I first started trying to simplify my life, and in those years I’ve struggled with clutter, I’ve had surges and ebbs of complications and simplicity, I’ve tried dozens of methods of simplifying from as many sources. It’s been an interesting journey, although not one that I can recommend to everyone. If you’re looking to simplify a certain aspect of your life, you don’t want to go through that kind of confusion.
So I’ve boiled it down to a simple method of Four Laws of Simplicity (apologies to John Maeda) that you can use on any area of your life, and in fact on your life as a whole:
1. Collect everything in one place.
2. Choose the essential.
3. Eliminate the rest.
4. Organize the remaining stuff neatly and nicely.
Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. - Confucius
To illustrate, let’s take a quick look at how to declutter a drawer. Let’s say this is the worst junk drawer in your home — it has take-out menus from restaurants that closed down a dozen years ago, manuals for computers that used DOS as their primary OS, tools that you have no idea how to use, more rubber bands, paper clips and chopsticks than you can ever use, mementos from your unfortunate foray into rubber stamp hobbying, souvenirs from that Mexico City trip you’d rather forget about, not to mention a funky smell that reminds you of gym class.
You could spend all day sorting through such a mess and still have a mess. (Or more likely, you’ll close the drawer and forget about it.) But let’s see how the 4-step method would be applied to our drawer:
1. Collect. Take out everything and put it in a pile. Empty the entire drawer, and pile it all on a counter or a table. Take everything out, down to the last paper clip.
2. Choose. Pick out only the few things you love and use and that are important to you. Just sort through the pile, picking out the really essential stuff. Be very selective. Put the important stuff you pick out into a separate, smaller pile.
3. Eliminate. Toss the rest out. You know you’ll never need those manuals again. Don’t be sentimental with this step. Either throw everything into a big trash bag, or find a new home for some of the items if you think someone might have a use for them — donate them to charity or give them to a friend who would love them. And yes, you have to toss out all the chopsticks.
4. Organize. Put back the essential things, neatly, with space around things. Clean the drawer out first, of course, and put the very small pile of things you chose back in the drawer, grouping like things together and leaving space around the groups. Having space around things makes everything look neater and simpler.
That’s it. You now have a very nice, simplified junk drawer, with (let’s hope) a much less funky smell.
This simple method can be applied to every area of your life. My suggestion is to focus on one area at a time, apply the method, and then move to the next area. So, if you just wanted to simplify a couple areas of your life, you could focus on one per week, but if you wanted to simplify your entire life, I’d do one area every couple of days until you’re done.
Here are some examples of how you could apply the above method to other areas of your life:
Closets. Focus on one area of the closet at a time — a shelf at a time for instance. Take everything off the shelf and put it in a pile on the floor. Pick out only the really important stuff that you love and use. Put the rest in a box to donate. Put the important stuff back on the shelf, grouping like things together and leaving space around the groups. You could use containers for groups of things, using clear containers and labeling them. Or just leave the shelves fairly empty, and get rid of most of your stuff. Move on to the next area. My suggestion is to leave the floor of your closet clear — it makes it look much nicer and simpler.
Your desk. Clear everything off the surface of your desk (excepting, perhaps, you computer and phone). For the surface of the desk, I would suggest only putting your inbox and a nice photo or two, and nothing else. Put supplies in a drawer, and file the papers. Toss out the rest. Then do the drawers of your desk the same way, one at a time, leaving space in each drawer. It’s so much more relaxing to work in a simplified environment. After you’re done with the desk, do your walls.
Your work tasks. Have a long to-do list (or a bunch of long context lists)? Spend a little time adding every task or project you can think of to your lists, until it’s as complete as you can (GTD’s brain dump works for this). Then choose only the tasks that you really want to do, or that will give you the absolute most long-term benefit, and put those on a separate, shorter list. The rest of the stuff? See if you can eliminate them, or delegate them, or at least put them on a someday/maybe list to be considered later. Then only focus on your short list, trying to choose the three most important things on the list to do each day.
Your commitments. Make a list of all your commitments in your life, from work to personal. Include hobbies, clubs, online groups, civic groups, your kids’ activities, sports, home stuff, etc. Anything that regularly takes up your time. Now pick out the few of those that really give you value, enjoyment, long-term benefits. Toss the rest, if possible. It might be difficult to do that, but you can get out of commitments if you just tell people that you don’t have the time anymore. This will leave you with a life that only has the commitments you really enjoy and want to do. Leave space around them, instead of filling up your life.
Your wardrobe. Do you really need 40 T-shirts? Or 40 pairs of shoes? How many jeans do you actually wear? One drawer or section of your closet at a time, put everything on your bed in a pile, choose the clothes you really love and actually wear on a regular basis, donate the rest, and put the ones you love back in your drawers or closet. Leave space around the clothes — don’t stuff your drawers full.
A room. If you’d like to simplify your cluttered rooms, start with the furniture. Which ones do you love and use? Get rid of the rest. Now clear every flat surface in the room, from counters to tables to shelves to desktops. Choose the stuff you love, and get rid of the rest. Leave the flat surfaces as clear as possible, only putting back a few choice objects. Now do the drawers and cabinets the same way. Also do everything on your floor that’s not a piece of furniture, leaving the floor as clear as humanly possible.
Your email inbox. Have an email inbox full of clutter? Dump all your emails in your inbox into a folder. Scan through the folder, choosing only a few to reply to and putting those in a separate folder. Delete or archive the rest.
As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness. - Henry David ThoreauLeave Your Comments Here.
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